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Unless correspondents ask us not to, this Website will post selected letters that it receives and invite open debate. |
Luigi
Capano
writes from Naples, Italy, on October 27, 1999
I'M studying the Spanish civil war and particularly Guernica's bombardment. I would ask you a question about Picasso's masterpiece "Guernica". Some studies says it had originally another title: "El muerte del torero Joselito" [the death of the bullfighter Joselito]. But I have found no evidence. Could you prove that "Guernica" is really an older painting dedicated to Joselito's death ? Excuse for my awful English and best regards.
David Irving
replies:
I have seen the original notebooks in which Picasso sketched the outlines of the famous painting which became the Guernica painting. The sketches are drawn before the April 1937 bombardment of Guernica, in which 93 people (yes, 93) died; and the sketches were of a bullfight. But I do not recall having seen the title you describe. So the answer is a "half-Yes."
[Incidentally, go to: http://web.org.uk/picasso/secret_guernica-f.html]
David Irving