GUERNICA: A WINDOW OF HOPE
AND A WORLD OF CHAOS

Guernica may just be the most important single painting in the twentieth century. It was painted by Picasso in the first two months of the international teaching campaign in April-June of 1937. Guernica, a town in Spain, was bombed in April 1937, the very month that the first Seven Year Plan began. After more than forty years trying to take my particular message to my contemporaries I find this apocalyptic painting curiously relevant in its symbolism. The painting graphically portrays the world I have been trying to teach all these years. -Ron Price with thanks to Encarta(R) Encyclopedia, Microsoft Corporation, 27 June 1997 with a slight revision on 10 February 2002.

Complex symbolism here, no
definitive interpretation, of a
world falling apart back then:
a dying horse, a dying age,
system, time; a fallen warrior,
traditional systems of political
and religious orthodoxy falling
from their heights of power; a
mother and dead child, twentieth
century science and technology
whose child is anarchy; a woman
trapped in a burning building,
civilization in a firey tempest;
a woman rushing into the scene,
a new revelation just begun
spreading its healing message.
A figure leaning from a window
and holding out a lamp,
truth and understanding held out
that all those who look might see.

And so, one view of Picasso’s work,
as an international Plan
makes its appearance
after a hiatus of twenty years,
after a new administration
had been created to canalize the forces
unleashed by those immortal Tablets.1
Guernica, the picture of a world in chaos
as the lamp of unity hangs out its shingle
in the obscurest corner, the only sign
of power and life as the old is destroyed.2

1Tablets of the Divine Plan, ‘Abdu’l-Baha, 1916-17.
2 There are many interpretations of this painting. This last line comes from Joseph Campbell, Creative Mythology, Viking Press, 1968, p.211.

Ron Price
27 June 1997/10 February 2002

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Ron Price is a retired teacher, aged 60. He taught for 30 years in primary, secondary and post-secondary schools. He lives with his wife, Chris, in Tasmania. Their 3 children are now aged: 39, 34 and 27. Ron moved to Australia from Canada in 1971. He has written three books since 1999. They are all available on the internet for free.
He has been a member of the Baha'i Faith since 1959.