In
the United Nations headquarters in New York there is a full size replica tapestry
copy of the
large grey toned painting Picasso did for the 1937 Paris Exhibition. The
painting is called ‘Guernica’ and it depicts the horrors of the bombing the
Nazis did to innocent civilians in April 1937 to the town of Guernica during
the Spanish civil war. It is widely considered to be one of his masterpieces.
Fast-forward
to the 5th of February 2003 and Colin Powell
and John Negroponte gave a press conference at the United Nations
regarding what was then going to be the likely conflict of the second Iraq war. The conference
was held in the same room that had the tapestry copy hanging up and a large
blue curtain was placed to cover it so that it would not be visible in the
background. Many journalists suspect that the Bush Administration covered the
tapestry for the reason that it’s not really the sort of picture you want in
the background when arguing a case for a controversial war.
Controversy
always surrounds Picasso’s work. Some people can’t stand it saying he draws
like a child, and that it is stupid messy art that anyone can do.
Ironically
Picasso himself even commented on this stating:
“All
children are artists. The problem is how to remain an artist once he grows up”
and..
“It
took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child”
He
of course was right…. Here are some examples of his very early child hood works….
This
is why I personally love his work and why he is a hero to me. He knew he could
draw well from a young age. I think he got bored with that after awhile as he
couldn’t take it anywhere new, different and interesting. Over the following
years he decided challenged all the rules of art and throw them apart. He inspired
completely new ways of doing works, inspiring all sorts of movements and
styles. He inspired not just artists but other areas such architecture, graphic
design, fashion and product design. He helped to break free from the old ways
of classical traditional painting and turned the art world on its head.
Many
of his works weren’t about drawing a subject all perfect and formally correct,
instead it was much more how to express the essence of the subject …. capturing
all the intangible characteristics rather the obvious surface level tangible
ones.
To
illustrate this point take a look at these drawings Picasso did of a Spanish Bull:
You
can see him showing how you can still have the essence of a subject but can experiment
with it and really turn into something new and interesting. It goes back to his
quote of drawing like a child ... it is hard to draw like a child when you are a
serious and formally trained artist. You have to train your self to strip
things down to their simplistic essence and to un-do all that you have learnt
before. Children draw with an unhinged level of freedom and creativity and that
is what Picasso wanted in his work. Being a trained formal artist though helped
him achieve greatness as he could take this approach and meld it with visual
knowledge and techniques to take his work into the realm of greatness and
genius.
To
show you what a genius I think he was have a look at this short video montage
of him at work. … It shows the passion and energy the man had all throughout
his life even at old age and the vast wealth fame and celebrity superstar
status that he gained.
Enjoy!
