All posts tagged: Picassos

Spain Culture Minister Rejects Basque Request to Loan Picasso’s Guernica

Spain Culture Minister Rejects Basque Request to Loan Picasso’s Guernica

Published by José Betancourt

When the Basque regional government made a formal request last week to Spain‘s Ministry of Culture to authorize a temporary loan of Pablo Picasso‘s Guernica (1937), the region’s head of government, Lehendakari Imanol Pradales, said he expected more robust discussion on the issue after Easter Sunday. According to El País, that discussion came on Tuesday—and the culture minister, Ernest Urtasun, was unequivocal. During a government oversight session in Spain’s Senate, Urtasun told senator Igotz López, of the Basque National Party, that he would not approve the transfer request. Related Articles “I understand the sensitivity behind this request,” Urtasun said. “We are talking about a work linked to the memory of Gernika and the pain it symbolizes. My obligation is to guarantee access to culture and also to safeguard our heritage. In matters like this, we must listen to the experts who have been preserving the work for 30 years. Their reports are clear and advise against moving the piece due to the risks involved. Celebrating the 90th anniversary of Gernika should also mean ensuring that …

Picasso’s Guernica Could Leave Madrid for First Time in Over 30 Years

Picasso’s Guernica Could Leave Madrid for First Time in Over 30 Years

Published by Jenni Sidey

The Basque regional government has formally asked Spain’s Ministry of Culture to authorize a temporary loan of Pablo Picasso‘s Guernica to the Guggenheim Museum Bilbao, according to Ara, a Catalan-language newspaper. If the move is approved, it would mark the first time the painting has traveled since it was installed at Madrid’s Museo Reina Sofía in 1992. The proposed transfer would take place between October 2026 and June 2027, coinciding with the 90th anniversary of the bombing of Guernica, the Basque city whose destruction by Nazi and Italian Fascist air forces on April 26, 1937, inspired Picasso to paint the antiwar canvas. Related Articles Imanol Pradales, the lehendakari, or head of government, for Basque Country in northern Spain, said the proposed loan would be “a formula for symbolic reparation and historical memory” for the Basque people, as well as a “message to the world” about “what war entails and the atrocity that derives from dictatorship,” per Ara. It’s far from the first transfer request from the Basque government for Guernica. The government has done so …

Recovered Picassos at Center of Art Theft Trial in Nice, France

Recovered Picassos at Center of Art Theft Trial in Nice, France

Published by José Betancourt

Seven years after an undercover sting led police to a house packed with stolen art in the hills above Nice, the case has returned to court, with ten defendants now on trial over a cache that included several works by Pablo Picasso. The trial, which opened earlier this month in Nice, revisits a 2017 judicial police operation that recovered more than 20 stolen artworks, including at least seven works by Picasso, following a tip that major pieces were being quietly offered for sale on the Côte d’Azur. Related Articles According to reporting by Nice-Matin, investigators from the Police Judiciaire went undercover, posing as a Swiss buyer and his assistant, after receiving intelligence from Belgium that stolen artworks were circulating locally. The officers arranged a meeting at a hotel in Nice, where a seller allegedly proposed a multimillion-euro cash deal, before leading them to a house in the village of Peillon, north of the city. Inside the Peillon property, police said they discovered what amounted to a private display of stolen art. Among the works identified were Picasso’s Le vieux roi and Le clown, along with other paintings, sculptures, …