Grief Is Timeless

The Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) was a struggle of power between the Republican government and Nationalist insurgents. On April 26, 1937, German forces—allies of the Republicans—bombed the Spanish city of Guernica. Pablo Picasso’s Guernica artifactualizes the devastation of this bombing through its extensive portrayal of senseless violence and women seeking to grapple with the pervasiveness of death; since this depiction of suffering is applicable to any war or war crime, Guernica is a universal, timeless anti-war piece.

Through its striking, incoherent portrayals of violence and suffering, Picasso’s Guernica encapsulates the tragedy and chaos of the bombing of the city of Guernica during the Spanish Civil War. The distorted, overlapping shapes characteristic of Cubist paintings contribute to the artwork’s overwhelming sense of wartime anguish. Although the painting is not true to life, it successfully captures the raw pain relatives of the bombing’s victims experienced. On the left side of the painting, a mother mourns the loss of her son due to the attack. This poignant representation of loss evokes sympathy for all of the disaster’s casualties and mirrors what a devastating blow it was to the citizens of Guernica. In the center of the painting, a horse—representing strength—squeals in agony as it is pierced with a sword. This symbolizes how the unwarranted bombing of Guernica shook the solidarity of an otherwise strong nation. Picasso also utilizes wordplay to contextualize the painting: the light bulb above the horse alludes to the Spanish word for light bulb (bombilla), which sounds like the Spanish word for bomb (bomba). The painting’s overall lack of coherence references the fact that war is completely devoid of meaning; all of this chaos, suffering, and violence ultimately amounts to nothing. Picasso’s painting is so potent because it expresses the senseless destruction of war so perfectly.

Guernica portrays the tragedies of war that are most familiar to noncombatants—most notably women—on the homefront in order to garner more support against war. In “Picasso’s Guernica: A Matter of Metaphor,” art historian Rachel Wischnitzer cites Reinhold Hohl’s claim that “The women are the real victims of Guernica”; I agree with this claim. The woman on the left mourning her dead child quotes Michelangelo’s Pieta, a sculpture of the Virgin Mary holding Jesus in her arms as he dies. Michelangelo’s sculpture represents the most extreme symbol of sacrifice—Jesus giving up his life to save humanity. The juxtaposition of this religiously charged piece with the meaningless violence in the rest of the scene highlights how there was meaning in the story of Jesus’s death to Christians but there is no meaning in the deaths from the bombing. Key differences in the two artworks further reinforce this point. In Pieta, Mary solemnly holds Jesus, sad but accepting of his death; in contrast, the mother in Guernica uncontrollably weeps over her deceased son. Unlike the Virgin Mary, this mother does not have closure because the death of her child was arbitrary and meaningless. Picasso utilizes religious references to contrast how war is not meaningful in the way some deaths are.

The depiction of the ruins of war in Pablo Picasso’s Guernica serves as an emotional plea to end war. Since most of the population was not exposed to the horrors of war firsthand, they relied on depictions in the media in order to get a better sense of these unspeakable atrocities. In addition to causing many soldiers to die, war also afflicts those at home. These afflictions are the easiest for noncombatant citizens to relate to.

Exposing the Slaveholders’ Deceptive Ways

Fig. 1. Hale Woodruff. “The Mutiny on the Amistad.” Amistad Murals. 1939. Oil on canvas. Talladega College. Talladega, Alabama.

During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, slavery was prevalent in America. Many abolitionists, such as freedman Frederick Douglass, spoke out against the use of slavery, gradually shifting the national majority in favor of the abolitionist cause; abolitionists’ influence persisted past the Civil War Era, as evident in modern representations of slavery, such as those by African-American artist Hale Woodruff.

In Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Frederick Douglass examines how slave masters maintained control of their slaves by granting them a brief vacation from work; this holiday overindulged slaves with the freedom they so desperately desired in order to discreetly present freedom as a cause that is not worth fighting for. Douglass introduces the winter holiday as “time [the slaves] regarded as [their] own, by the grace of [their] masters” (114). On the surface level, this break from work seems to be a voluntary act of kindness from the slaveholders. However, Douglass recognizes that these days off actually functioned as a tool to convince slaves that they are not missing anything because they lack freedom. During the holidays, the masters overindulged slaves with alcohol and leisurely activities, eventually “disgust[ing] the slave[s] with freedom, by allowing [them] to see only the abuse of it” (116). These holidays distorted slaves’ expectations of being free men by exposing them to the polar opposite of slavery—reckless, excessive freedom. By the time the holidays were over, the slaves felt sick of freedom; as a result, their masters would not have to worry about the threat of rebellion. Douglass exposes the slaveholders as ruthless manipulators in order to provide more reasons to rise up against slavery.

The method Douglass describes has striking parallels to Sun Tzu’s theory of war as the art of deception. Sun Tzu states, “The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.” In essence, that is exactly what the slaveholders have done. They set aside this holiday to provide slaves with exactly what they want—freedom—but present it to them in a way that is entirely different from what it actually is. As a result, slaves developed the misguided impression that freedom is somewhat of a burden. In Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave, Douglass states:

So, when the holidays ended, we staggered up from the filth of our wallowing, took a long breath, and marched to the field,—feeling upon the whole, rather glad to go, from what our master had deceived us into a belief was freedom, back to the arms of slavery. (116)

The brief period of overindulgence riddled with “filth” functioned exactly as the slaveholders intended: it acted as a buffer that delayed slave revolt. Rather than merely being obligated to return to work, the slaves were somewhat relieved to. Douglass dissected the slaveholders’ method to keeping their slaves under control in order to warn slaves of their masters’ disingenuous intentions.

“The Mutiny on the Amistad” (Fig. 1) by Hale Woodruff depicts a violent slave uprising; this is what slaveholders feared and tried to prevent through tactics such as those outlined by Frederick Douglass. This mural is part of a series that celebrates the abolishment of slavery. It depicts a noteworthy event in the Spanish slave trade: African slaves physically revolt against their captors, who show no signs of resistance. The slaves are portrayed as fearless and strong, fighting for their freedom; in contrast, their captors are seen surrendering or running away, with no true resolve. In addition to implying that slaves are more valiant than their masters, this illustration commemorates the bravery of slaves who recognized the urgency of the abolitionist cause. The mural’s vibrant colors and cartoonish style detract from the violence of the situation and instead romanticize the insurgency. By emphasizing the historical significance of the slave revolt, Woodruff urges slaves to fight against their masters, who—as suggested by this mural—do not have any real power over them. Hale Woodruff’s “The Mutiny on the Amistad” illustrates what can happen when slaves seek justice against their deceptive masters.

Abolitionists were largely responsible for spreading anti-slavery sentiment, encouraging slaves to fight or run away from their masters and the majority of Americans to disapprove of slavery. Their influence was so powerful that it extended beyond the post-Civil War Era, inspiring works of fairly modern artists such as Hale Woodruff.