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[ Presenting plain-text part of multi-format email ] >>UNITED NATIONS -- As Secretary of State Colin L. Powell presented evidence to help U.N. >ambassadors decide whether or not to go to war against Iraq, there was one important thing they >did not see: Pablo Picasso's "Guernica." A tapestry version of one of the world's greatest antiwar works that adorns the wall outside the Security Council chamber was covered Wednesday by a blue curtain with U.N. logos. A U.N. commentary on war and peace? ambassadors wondered. Trying to avert a diplomatic incident, the U.N. spokesman explained. When U.N. media officials moved a microphone where diplomats stop to talk to journalists in front of the tapestry to accommodate the crush of media covering Powell's presentation, TV reporters complained that the wild lines and screaming figures on the tapestry made a bad backdrop. And in head shots, a horse's hindquarters appeared just above the face of the speaker. U.N. officials covered it, but they deny that they were intentionally hiding a symbolic statement about both the horrors of war and the art of diplomacy. The work portrays a Spanish Civil War aerial bombing.<< http://www.latimes.com/la-fg-guernica6feb06004424,0,7556991.story <<On April 27th, 1937, unprecedented atrocities are perpetrated on behalf of Franco against the civilian population of a little Basque village in northern Spain. Chosen for bombing practice by Hitler's burgeoning war machine, the hamlet is pounded with high-explosive and incendiary bombs for over three hours. Townspeople are cut down as they run from the crumbling buildings. Guernica burns for three days. Sixteen hundred civilians are killed or wounded. By May 1st, news of the massacre at Guernica reaches Paris, where more than a million protesters flood the streets to voice their outrage in the largest May Day demonstration the city has ever seen. Eyewitness reports fill the front pages of Paris papers. Picasso is stunned by the stark black and white photographs. Appalled and enraged, Picasso rushes through the crowded streets to his studio, where he quickly sketches the first images for the mural he will call Guernica. His search for inspiration is over.<< http://www.pbs.org/treasuresoftheworld/a_nav/guernica_nav/main_guerfrm.html --------------------------------- Do you Yahoo!? Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now _______________________________________________ Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk