Natural light
  • News and Blog

Nature's Guernica

19/10/2015

0 Comments

 

Picasso helps locals win momentous victory

Guernica Zilbeti
©Gari Bilbao
The beechwoods of Zilbeti, in the foothills of the Navarran Pyrenees, have seen their fair share of momentous battles.  It was here that Charlemagne's advance was halted by local Basque fighters in 778. Napoleon's France and Spanish forces saw significant action in 1794, and in 1813 Wellington repelled French relief forces after a series of bloody setbacks.  And the peace of the forest could hardly resist the brutality of the 1930s that afflicted all Spain.

Since 2010 another battle has raged, over the future of the forest itself.  Arrayed on one side, a Grand Coalition of the mining company MAGNA and the Government of Navarra.  On the other, the meagre forces of the tiny village of Zilbeti and their supporters in neighbouring areas, local conservation groups and national NGOs such as SEO-BirdLife Spain.

There is much at stake.  The company believe their exisiting magnesite mine is becoming harder to exploit as reserves dwindle.  To gain access to new sources they proposed to fell 54,390 beech trees, including, as local ecologists documented, 17,306 mature ones, some centuries old.  The forest is  home to 20% of Spain's threatened white-backed woodpeckers, as well as European mink and the elusive Pyrenean desman.  Moreover, it is protected under European law.

Villagers and the local organisation Coordinadora Monte Alduide decided to call for reinforcements.  SEO-BirdLife took up the cause and led a legal fight in the Navarran High Court.  But the most audacious manoeuvre came from the local troops themselves
The 1937 bombing by German and Italian forces of Guernica, just 50 miles away, was the most infamous atrocity of the Civil War.  Within months, Picasso's outraged response was touring the world, and was to become the greatest and most famous work of 20th Century art.

A copy now hangs in the United Nations, a tragically impotent talisman to ward off the horrors of war and oppression.

But Picasso's Guernica has at last helped bring a war to an end.  Planning was complex, meticulous and clandestine.  Over six nights, 46 beech trees were chosen and the painting's image projected into the forest in order to establish the exact position of each element.
Picture
©Gari Bilbao
a symbol of oppression and of hope
Then, in a single morning, fifty people wielding organic, biodegradable pigments filled in the design.  They created an extraordinary Guernica de Zilbeti some 25 metres wide by 15 high.  It is an incredible study in inverse perspective:  the nearest and farthest trees are separated by 52 metres, yet the final work, if viewed from the specially contructed viewing platform, created a 2-D effect from a vast 3-D space.SEO-BirdLife's Ramón Elosegui said "Guernica is a symbol of the consequences of oppression, but at the same time a symbol of hope."

This week the High Court gave victory to the forest.
Picture
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Welcome

    to 
    NATURAL LIGHT
    a site devoted to nature, and artists who are 
    inspired by it

    editor Laurence Rose

    Follow us on 
    Facebook and Twitter
    Email us

    RSS Feed

    Tweets by @Naturemusicpoet

    Archives

    October 2018
    September 2018
    May 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    August 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    October 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    April 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    April 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014

    Categories

    All
    Australia
    BBC Proms
    Biodiversity
    Birds
    Campaigns
    Cheltenham Festival
    Conversations
    Endangered Species
    Environment
    Fenland
    Festivals
    Flamenco
    Hear And Now
    Iceland
    Landscape
    Literature
    Moth
    Music
    Norfolk Festival Of Nature
    Olivier Messiaen
    Peter Sculthorpe
    Poetry
    Re:Tweet Of The Day
    RSPB
    Sibelius
    Soundscape
    Spain
    Ted Hughes
    The Long Spring
    Uplands
    Wetlands
    Words
    WW1

Powered by Create your own unique website with customizable templates.