Astonished by Pablo Picasso Art affects people, society and our daily lives in many different ways. For this reason it has always been one of my favourite themes. As a child I was fascinated when my parents took me to art galleries and museums, especially the Museum of Fine Arts in Asturias. I really enjoyed music, literature and sculpture but painting was definitely my favourite subject. I used to attend painting classes and tried to imitate the works of so many great Spanish artists such as Pablo Picasso, the co-founder of the Cubist movement and the surrealist painter Salvador Dalí. I remember a trip I made long time ago with my school classmates and my teacher to Madrid. We spent a couple of days in the capital visiting several touristic places and museums. The ‘National Museum and Centre of Art Reina Sofia’, where el Guernica is located, was one of them. Once I saw this extraordinary masterpiece by Picasso I was surprised as the painting was much bigger than what I had previously imagined. I immediately understood why it is considered the most moving and powerful anti-war paintings in history. While contemplating the painting I felt transported to the suffering of the Spanish Civil War and I also felt the violence, the chaos and the agony people depicted in the work were experiencing after the bombing thrown by Condor Legion and the Fascist Italian Aviazione Legionaria in the village with the same name as the painting, Guernica. In spite of not being especially interested in cubism I found the work as one of the best creations I had ever seen before. The composition and the volumetric figures led the viewer a chance to admire and try to guess what is painted on the canvas. By going deeper into the analysis of this work I was able to understand in more detail the history of the Spain and even its culture as the most astonishing and dominant elements in Picasso’s work were the bull and the horse, two important characters in our country. I would fully recommend visiting this marvellous masterpiece and hopefully you will enjoy it as much as I did.