Does the Gernika painting by Picasso have anything to do with the Basques?
It is the painting which the Government of the Republic commissioned to Picasso and it refers to the horrors of the war. Due to the Civil War, the town of Gernika was totally destroyed on 26th April 1937 by the German aviation of the Condor Legion, sent by Hitler to collaborate with the French army. For approximately four hours, German planes reduced the whole city to rubble. This experimental act gave rise to the barbarities of later wars. At the end of the Second World War the painting became the symbol of freedom and Picasso an artistic hero for both the communist block and for the western block. In his will he wrote that the Gernika should be returned to Spain when he had died. The painting is currently exhibited in the Reina Sofía Museum in Madrid.
