My Travel Book - In Search of "Guernica" in Gernika-Lumo (Euskadi_Basque Country), Spain

I do have to confess that Picasso is not my favorite painter, for many reasons which are not relevant here so I won’t expatiate upon my artistic crazes...

But there is no doubt about one point though. Whenever I plan a trip to Madrid, I make sure I’ll spend a few hours at Museo Reina Sofia. Why? Because there is a painting there that always takes my breath away. Such a violent feel actually. But I have to come back and come back again.

This painting is called “Guernica”. You have heard about it, no doubt but maybe you have never seen it in reality.

The painting is huge (7,87m wide and 3,50m high). Black and white and grey. Like a photograph actually. And it depicts something that is most unbearable and unfortunately quite endless. The horrors of war.

Many painters and artists have depicted wars but as far as I am concerned, no work has ever been as timeless as this one. No work has ever expressed so well human tragedy, unspeakable suffering and death of innocent civilians. No other work is such an absolute manifesto against war.

And yet it also depicts a true event in the style of Pablo Picasso.

In January 1937, Picasso who was living and working in Paris was asked by the Republican government of Spain to paint a mural for the International Exposition in Paris. Spain was then in the throes of a Civil War which had started six months before when the army had rebelled against the government. The painting was to express the scourge of civil war.

Rumor has it that at the time, Picasso did not really know what he’d be painting...

He then read George Speer’s eyewitness account of the bombing of a Basque small town called Guernica which was published in The Times and The New York Times two days after the destruction of the village (April 26, 1937).

And Picasso set to work immediately, actually one week after the bombing, four months after he had been commissioned and three weeks before the official opening of the “Exposition Internationale”.

(If you ever go to the Reina Sofia, don’t forget to look at all the drawings and the preparatory works for the mural. Picasso did not start painting outright. There was a lot of preparation involved besides the fact that this painting would somehow be the summary and the peak of Picasso’s thirty years of previous work.)

So there we are. “Guernica”. Looking more or less like a huge black and white picture from a newspaper...

But what happened in Gernika (its Basque name) on the 26th of April, 1937?

Gernika was and still is a small town in the Basque Country (Euskadi) in Northern Spain. In 1937, the whole region played a very important part in the fight against the rebels (also called the Nationalists) led by Franco. And Gernika is historically the seat of the parliament of the province of Biscay.

It may sound a little bit complicated but in 1937, Franco wanted to overthrow the Basque government and the Spanish Republican government as well... Hence what is now called the Spanish Civil War... when a lawfully elected socialist government in Europe was to be destroyed along with its supporters by a rebellious army essentially led by a general called Francisco Franco.

This Civil War was also to become the testing ground for the new hawkish Nazi German army which was called in by Franco for help (along with the Fascist Italian army).

On April 26, 1937 which was market day in Gernika (then crammed full with neighboring villagers too), the Condor Legion of Nazi Germany’s Luftwaffe bombed the village... The bombing and shooting lasted for several hours and the small town was almost completely wiped out.

No one will ever know how many people died or were wounded that day. Some say 300. Others, 1700... plus hundreds of wounded who ended up in Bilbao.

No matter what the numbers really were. That day, innocent civilians were bombed and gunned down and killed and maimed, inaugurating some deadly and very dark times for years and centuries to come, from 1937 until this very day and the days to come, I am afraid.

Last Sunday, we were driving from San Sebastian on our way to Bilbao when we decided on the spur of the moment to stop at Gernika. Gernika-Lumo as it is called now.

Well, this year has been the 69th anniversary of the Oradour-sur-Glane massacre where almost all the villagers were shot and burned by SS soldiers on their way to Normandy... This happened in France. 642 people. Men, women, children and babies. Ouradour-sur-Glane was never rebuilt. The burned-out ruins and objects have been preserved ever since. Our duty to remember the wantonness of barbarity.

Honestly I don’t know what we expected to find in Gernika. Maybe some “ruins” set up as a memorial? 76 years later?

The "village" looks so modern. 

There are a few “surviving” buildings... The school and a couple of churches besides very, very few ancient buildings... 

A ceramic mural that looks so incongruous. One very shrunken version of Picasso’s “Guernica”... It says: “‘Guernica’ Gernikara” which means "The Guernica (painting) to Gernika."

We went to the graveyard. There is a monument there that is supposed to be some kind of a grave for all the dead on that fateful 26 of April, 1937.  No names. The date. And “Pax” written on a stele...

There is one bell, supposedly the one that tolled the minute the planes got there.

There is also a very new plate with the names of the men from the village who died in camps before and after Franco won the war.

And then, there is the Peace Memorial. Yes, there is a Peace Park and a Peace Memorial with two sculptures. “Gure Aitaren Etxea” (1988) by Basque sculptor Eduardo Chillida and “Large Figure in a Shelter” (1992) by British sculptor Henry Moore. These sculptures are symbolic of Gernika-Lumo as a city of peace.

"Gure Aitaren Etxea" by Eduardo Chillida

"Large Figure in a Shelter" by Henry Moore

Because Gernika has chosen to represent “Peace” instead of “Memory” or “Revenge”. Well, I am not really for “Revenge” either especially since this war was a Civil War.

But because I am French and because I grew up with the children of those Republican families who more or less survived only because they had fled their country after Franco’s victory, I think I was expecting a little more “Memory” in Gernika.

There may be a very simple explanation though... Franco won the Civil War and established dictatorship over Spain from April 1, 1939 until his death, in November 20? 1975.

Memories had to be suppressed, especially the ones where his opponents had been so willfully killed and destroyed.

And then time went by. Omertà ruled at least in Spain while Franco was still ruling. And grief became dull I suppose...

And Gernika became the world center for peace. Which is hard for me to accept but quite easy to reason out.

The thing is... how do you survive after living through this kind of hell without any recognition... from 1937 till 1975?

I really don’t have any answer to this question. Is “Guernica” an answer?
Well, I don’t think so. It is too intellectually apocalyptic, isn’t it?







(Incidentally...

Picasso had “Guernica” sent to the United States where it was exhibited in New York’s MoMA until Franco’s death. Well this is a very short summary...

MoMA finally gave back “Guernica” to Spain after the King Juan Carlos transformed Franco’s dictatorship into a democratic constitutional monarchy.

I remember first seeing “Guernica” in 1984 at the “Casón del Buen Retiro” which is an annex to El Prado Museum. It was protected with bullet-proof glass and machine guns! Quite an experience!

In 1992, it was moved to a special gallery at the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofia... in a much friendlier environment.)







*Good Luck, and Good Night*

Do You Like to Be Alone? I Do. A Lot.

Who knows what this beautiful girl was thinking about? (Believe me. She was beautiful.)

She also was very much alone amidst so many people on the beach. She did not look sad nor lost. She was looking at the sea and she was dreaming. Period.

The weather was delightful. Very warm. 5:00 p.m. On the 23rd of October. Quite wonderful, I know.

I was feeling elated when we started our walk on the beach. We were having such a nice time in Barcelona.

Those past few months, Popeye has been going through real bad times and he was getting ready to brave even worse weather.

Barcelona was such a peaceful touchdown for us. We had one whole week-end to try to get our breath and to restore our inner strength. Together.

Barcelona was an excellent choice. Popeye has been there quite a lot ever since it started changing into a very modern, huge, wealthy and ebullient city. The last time I had been to Barcelona? Oh well... Swee’ Pea was 5. So let’s say more than 25 years...

At the time, Barcelona was a little bit dreary. It was a port more than a city. I remember visiting the Miró museum and Gaudi’s Park Güell and Sagrada Familia...

Popeye loves Barcelona and of course I fell in love with the new Barcelona. We did a lot of things in the few hours we were to spend there together. It was fun and delightful. We walked around a lot which for us is mandatory to get to know a city. 

Quite late on Sunday afternoon, we decided to go take a walk on the beach after a storm.

This is when and where I noticed this beautiful girl, so lost in reverie  that she was totally oblivious to people around her.

I still had not really made up my mind about what I’d be doing during the following week while Popeye would be attending a seminar a few hours away (by car) from Barcelona.

I was supposed to fly back to Paris and then go to Brussels... and all of a sudden, the answer was loud and clear. I was going to stay in Barcelona, by myself. In a city where I did not know one single person. In a city I did not know my way around...

You see, I am a lot like the girl on the beach. I love being around people but I need to be totally on my own from time to time. When I saw her, she reminded so much of my own life.

I like loneliness. I have to, of course. My husband is away a lot. But after spending so many years in my beloved Tertres, I know I love to be alone without feeling lonely. Actually I love being on my own. Maybe because I know it won’t last too much... From one to three/four weeks at the most.

I am so used to being on my own that I get through life quite easily. Just like the girl on the beach, I can spend hours just watching the sea (when in Brittany). Lucky me with enough time on my hands to waste a few hours doing nothing else but watching and dreaming.

Except that I do not feel I am wasting my time. Something new and usually great, something interesting anyway comes out from those moments of intense loneliness. It always does. Ideas. Projects. Decisions.

All of which would not have come through nor to my mind in the hustle and bustle of my daily life. My normal daily life, I mean. The life with my husband, my son or my friends.

Of course, being alone because one’s husband or wife is away or gone is totally different from choosing to be alone because one needs to be completely alone.

I hope the girl on the beach was lonely because it was her choice. All of a sudden, it hits me. Maybe she was downright lonely and unhappy.

Well, tonight, all by myself at Les Tertres, I am not lonely nor unhappy. I do need time to be on my own. Lots of things to do, lots of things worth thinking about, lots of books to read... Lots of freedom!


Some people need their beauty sleep. I need my beauty loneliness, I guess.







*Good Luck, and Good Night*

My Travel Book - Spain - Begging in Madrid

We first met almost two years ago in Madrid.

I’m used to beggars in Paris.

Some beg thrusting their open hand to you. Some are women with children, sitting down in the subway passages. Some get into the subway cars and start begging, using the same sentences they all have learnt by heart. Others stand at the lights, waiting for cars to stop by.

It was quite a shock when I came upon these two men, very close to my hotel.

Hard to understand what they were representing. But they were there on the sidewalk. Petrified below a very hot sun in a very thick reddish rubber covering.

People were attracted to them but it took me quite a while to understand that actually there was only one man «alive» there. Because from time to time he’d close his eyes while the other one never did.

It was a very unusual, fascinating and artsy way of begging. «They» got a lot of attention and I’d say, a lot of money too. Which was totally right because it did take guts to do something like this on a burning sidewalk in Madrid.

We were very busy and while I kept bumping into «them» every time we’d leave the hotel on our way to the museums, I kind of put him in a tiny spot in my brain where he got lost for quite a long time.

Last month, I went back to Madrid.

Right after checking in the hotel, guess where we went. To El Prado of course. One year and a half without Las Meninas or El Greco and Goya... You’ve got to be kidding!

At the very same corner, we bumped into... the «couple», sitting right there on the same spot... as if they had been waiting for us.

The setting had been completely changed. They claimed to be «twins» from Pompei and the begging bowl was as exquisite as a begging bowl can be. Because there was a «Gracias» (Thank you) written on it.

The «couple» drew crowds. People crying out in admiration but very interested after a few minutes. Were both twins alive? Who was real? The one with closed eyes? Or the other one?

Easy to find out. You only had to drop a coin in his begging bowl and the «real one» would very briefly open his eyes. He definitely could not smile so he opened briefly his eyes and looked straight to the donor. And then back to closed eyes.

I was flabbergasted once again. Incredible man.

I walked to him and told him how great this was. (Yes, I manage to speak enough Spanish to convey my admiration. And yes, I may have used a few signs to communicate better.)

Well, it worked. (Of course, I also gave him money because he was so gracefully saying «Gracias».)

And I took pictures. And he knew very well I was taking pictures...

After a couple of days, it became a game. I’d turn up and he’d flash a smile at me as soon as he’d notice me among the crowd surrounding him.

A smile?

Yes, a smile. At least, it was as close to a smile it could be considering how «petrified» he had to be for the admiring crowds around him.

And I’d smile back: «Muchas gracias, señor.»

He disappeared from the street corner two days before I left Madrid. I missed him!

I’ve tried the trick in El Prado with sculptures. It did not work at all. Probably because it is forbidden to take pictures in the museum.




*Good Luck, and Good Night*

"Queremos el cielo que veía Chanquete"

One morning in Madrid, on my way back to the hotel, I almost collided with a few demonstrators.

A handful of demontrators with a few banners. Very quiet. On the corner of two streets. Trying to establish a contact with passers-by.

Obviously it was all about air pollution. I don’t know whether it was about pollution in Madrid or in Spain in general . One of the banners said: «Nos estan fumigando.» («They are smoking us out» - no relation with tobacco though since other banners were pictures of the traces aircrafts leave in the sky.)

I suffer so much from respiratory allergies due to city air pollution that I kind of laughed. I was breathing so well in Madrid. Not many cars around besides cabs. Nothing to be compared with the terrible pollution in Paris and Brussels due to traffic congestion.

So I looked at the demonstrators, took a few pictures. I did not dare to start talking with them. I am too ashamed of my rusty spanish. It’s good enough to walk around but definitely not apt to a political discussion with students. (They definitely looked like students.)

And while I was walking away, I noticed a policeman who was obviously getting ready to hand a ticket to one of the demonstrators.
I then read the banner the girl was holding. It said: "Queremos ver al cielo que veía Chanquete." ("We want to see the sky that Chanquete was seeing.")
Quite different from the other banners all about air pollution.

The sky that Chanquete was seeing? I tried to remember what I knew about Spain and famous Spaniards.
I called Popeye: "Tell me, who is Chanquete?"

He had no idea even though he’s almost more Spanish than French.

So, what is left to do when you have access to the web in your hotel room?

Google «Chanquete» of course.


I was expecting to discover he had been one of the first Spanish environmentalists... since he obviously was no longer alive but was still fondly recalled during an anti-pollution demonstration.

How wrong one can be!
 
Chanquete is totally fictional. He was the hero of a Spanish tv show from the 80’s called ‘Verano Azul’ (Blue Summer).
 

Antonio Ferrandis was Chanquete .

Chanquete was an old fisherman living in his old boat, in a small village in Andalucia (Southern Spain). Teenagers came to vacation there. The whole weekly show was about lessons taught by a very wise old man to those kids to help them have a better life.
 
Chanquete died at the end of the show. I imagine that "lesson time" was over... The 90's were looming.
 
"Verano Azul" still is very famous and it is aired every summer in Spain. It also was on the air in France as well... in the early eighties. (I know now that by not watching tv, I have been missing a lot...)

When something goes wrong in the world... like a pollution problem, I always wonder about what my great-grandfather (Bon-Papa) would have thought about it. And I know that I kind of look back on his life with nostalgy - even though he had to go through two major wars.

Spanish people also have a grandfather to look up to - Chanquete, of course. It makes it far easier for everybody to understand that once, there was a better world, environmentally speaking.

Muchas gracias, Chanquete.



*Good Luck, and Good Night.