26/1/2024–|Last updated: 1/26/202404:23 AM (Mecca time)
On January 24, activists from the Greenpeace movement in Spain climbed onto the facade of the famous Reina Sofía Museum in the Spanish capital, Madrid, to hang a large banner containing a picture of a child from Gaza crying because of the devastation caused by Israel in the Strip.
The activists used a banner bearing an illustration by the American artist Shepard Fairey (Obi), based on a photo taken by the Palestinian photographer Bilal Khaled of a child in the Gaza Strip while raising a cry to save him from the scourge of the Israeli war.
In a post on the “X” platform, the organization said, “We climbed the façade of the Queen Sofia Museum to display a huge work by the artist OBEY. The image, which has an area of about 60 square meters, is adapted from a photo taken by the Palestinian reporter Bilal Khaled in Gaza with the message: Can you hear us?” .
🔴🔴🔴ACTION🔴🔴🔴
CEASE FIRE IN GAZA NOW
We climbed the façade of the Reina Sofía Museum to display a giant work by the artist OBEY.
The image, almost 60 m2, adapts a photo taken in Gaza by Palestinian reporter Belal Khaled with a message:
ARE YOU HEARING US? pic.twitter.com/EAc7STie9R— Greenpeace Spain (@greenpeace_esp) January 24, 2024
The picture contained two comments, the first saying, “Can you hear us?”, in reference to the child’s cry, while the second comment was, “Stop shooting now,” in reference to the aggression that Israel has launched against the residents of the Gaza Strip for about 111 days.
Painting “Guernica”… History repeats itself
On April 26, 1937, German aircraft heavily bombed the Spanish city of Guernica, and a three-hour blitzkrieg nearly wiped out the city, killing and wounding a third of the population.
The devastation caused by the German bombing of the city prompted the famous Spanish painter Pablo Picasso to work on completing his huge painting, which is 11.5 x 25.5 feet, or 3.49 x 7.77 meters, in about three weeks. He called it the painting “Guernica” in reference to the city of Guernica in the Spanish Basque region. .
Since Picasso painted it, the painting has toured throughout Europe, but fearing the Nazi occupation of France, Picasso loaned “Guernica” to the Museum of Modern Art “MOMA” in New York City, which toured the painting throughout the United States and elsewhere for approximately 20 years. Before returning to Madrid.
Queen Sofia Museum
The Reina Sofía National Central Museum of Art in Spain was officially opened on September 10, 1992. It is also known as the Maria Reina Sofía Museum and is one of the world's largest museums of modern and contemporary art.
The museum is located in the Spanish capital, Madrid, near the Atocha train and metro stations, at the southern end of the so-called “Golden Triangle of Arts”, which also includes the Museo del Prado and the Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum.
The museum includes paintings by the world's most prominent painters, such as Pablo Picasso and Salvador Dali, and Picasso's painting “Guernica” is one of the most famous artifacts in it.
The museum also contains a free library specializing in art, in addition to a collection of more than 100,000 books, more than 3,500 audio recordings, and about 1,000 video clips.
Source : Al Jazeera + Spanish press + social media sites