On April 26, 1937 the small Basque town of Guernica was destroyed by German bombs
The northern Spanish town of Guernica has been commemorating the 80th anniversary of the deadly bombing that inspired Pablo Picasso to paint a masterpiece.
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More than 1,500 people were killed and hundreds wounded when German warplanes devastated the city in support of Francisco Franco’s nationalist forces during Spain’s civil war.
Madrid’s Reina Sofia museum is also marking the anniversary with an exhibition dedicated to Picasso’s black and white mural, a work widely considered to be his finest.
Timothy James Clark is curator of the show,‘Piety and Terror in Picasso: the road to Guernica:
“Guernica has become and is still sort of used constantly in all kinds of contexts as the form we have for thinking about the nature of death under bombing.”
The exhibition, which brings together around 180-works from the Malaga-born artist, will be on display until September.