Almost one year ago I visited London Junkers installation “Harriet Tubman – Hero” at The Eye Arts (read here). When I got an invitation to see his newest installation “Guernica“, I was curious to see it. I went there Saturday, January 21st.
“Guernica” is an installation that remembers the attack on the town Guernica back in 1937 and is a tribute to Pablo Picasso’s famous large oil painting also named “Guernica”.
Guernica is one of Picasso’s best-known works, regarded by many art critics as the most moving and powerful anti-war painting in history. It is exhibited in the Museo Reina Sofía in Madrid.
The grey, black, and white painting, on a canvas 3.49 meters (11 ft 5 in) tall and 7.76 meters (25 ft 6 in) across, portrays the suffering wrought by violence and chaos. Prominent in the composition are a gored horse, a bull, screaming women, a dead baby, a dismembered soldier, and flames. Picasso painted Guernica at his home in Paris in response to the 26 April 1937 bombing of Guernica, a Basque Country town in northern Spain that was bombed by Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy at the request of the Spanish Nationalists. Upon completion, Guernica was exhibited at the Spanish display at the 1937 Paris International Exposition, and then at other venues around the world. The touring exhibition was used to raise funds for Spanish war relief. The painting soon became famous and widely acclaimed, and it helped bring worldwide attention to the 1936-1939 Spanish Civil War.
(source wikipedia)
Impressions of “Guernica” by London Junkers (1)
London Junkers’ installation consists of two 3D ensembles. One shows the attack of the town Guernica in 1937, the other is a 3D model of the famous painting on Picasso. London added two boards. One board is about the history of the attack and about Pablo Picasso’s painting. There London also has some quotes of Picasso.
The second board is a poem of London fitting to the anti-war theme of his installation and to the bullets fired from the airplanes.
BULL
by London Junkers
Black bullet crosses silent space,
Tearing the sky, breaking the flesh.
Deaf missile sound hitting all ears,
Ruining the dreams, raising their fears.
Cloudy dust, red blood burst,
Music dying slowly under the shadows.
The wingless birds refuse to fly,
tormented by the baby cries.
As flower petals float on rivers
of confusion and dementia.
Why is it that we do not learn?
And many have to die to die again.
Why is it that we never seek?
for happiness and wisdom?
Black bullet crossing empty fields,
searching for widow, monk and thief.
you paint in monochrome the scene,
while tiny ruby feet succumb to grief.
Death moves now swiftly standing tall,
Spitting bull bullets out its breath,
breaking the mirror that reflects,
the hate and greed that drives them all.
Impressions of “Guernica” by London Junkers (2)
The 3D model of Picasso’s painting is intriguing as you can walk through it and even become part of it. London added a third dimension. Nonetheless you can recognize the painting immediately. What you see in it (both in the painting and in the 3D model) is in the eye of the visitor of course. For me personally it expresses the madness and uselessness of war. Unfortunately that is something that had become so near to us in Europe and that also started with a surprising hostile attack. Picasso’s picture has become very persent again.
Impressions of “Guernica” by London Junkers (3) (upper left is Picasso’s picture, all others are London Junkers 3D model)
Thank you London for this installation, for the poem and for pointing us to Picasso’s picture in this day and age. I appreciate your poem and the installation. Well done!
Landmark to Guernica by London Junkers
http://maps.secondlife.com/secondlife/Montague%20Island/72/140/3510
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