Remaking Picasso's Guernica as a banner

Remaking Picasso's Guernica is a collective that has, since 2012, been working together to re-create a contemporary version of Picasso's Guernica in the form of a textile banner. This conference paper titled 'Remaking Picasso's Guernica: a work of art, an act of protest' was developed during the processes of making the banner and undertaking research on this collective project. It was delivered at the "Subversive Stitch Revisited: the Politics of Cloth" conference, 29-30 November 2013 at the V&A in London. The conference was organised by Jennifer Harris, Deputy Director, Whitworth Art Gallery, Manchester; Pennina Barnett, writer and curator, and Althea Greenan, Curator of the Women’s Art Library, Special Collections, Goldsmiths College, University of London, in collaboration with the V&A and Iniva (Institute of International Visual Arts). The conference was dedicated to the memory of Roszika Parker's groundbreaking feminist book 'The Subversive Stitch: embroidery and the making of the feminine' published in 1984. In this co-authored paper, Dr Rajguru and Dr Ashmore examined the problem of the lone female stitcher, raised by Rozsika Parker in 'The Subversive Stitch', as well as contemporary debates about art, craft, and activism. In Gijs van Hensbergen's words, Picasso's Guernica is a twentieth century icon. It has been widely reproduced in different media, including Goshka Macuga's monumental tapestry, exhibited at the Whitechapel Art Gallery in 2009. This paper examined this current project to 're-make' the painting in fabric form, which Megha Rajguru has contributed to, alongside Louise Purbrick and Nicola Ashmore. The Remaking Picasso's Guernics Collective is formed of Brighton-based activists and artists representing Amnesty International Brighton and Hove; Brighton Anti-Fascists; Brighton Voices in Exile; Gatwick Detainee Visitors Group; Migrant English Project; Palestine Solidarity Campaign Brighton and Hove; University of Brighton; and Women's International League for Peace and Freedom. The banner’s construction embodies an anti-fascist position and contains many unnamed individuals’ stitches regardless of their nationality, race, age, sex and religion. In this paper, we discussed processes of collective making; traced the life of the Guernica banner from one public sewing event to another; and finally, reflected upon the stitch as a form of protest. The full conference paper is available in the public domain as part of the conference proceedings in the form of a podcast.