Guernica in Tehran: From Anti-War Icon to Tool of Hypocrisy

I was planning to write a full report on Pablo Picasso’s exhibition in Tehran, but I got caught up with another project and time passed. Still, I didn’t want to miss the chance to share this piece here.

In a time when the world is blurred by the smoke and fire of wars, the exhibition of one of the most famous anti-war paintings of the 20th century—Guernica by Pablo Picasso—in Tehran is not just ironic; it’s a symbolic disaster. Guernica was created in memory of the brutal bombing of a small Spanish town by the same name in 1937. The attack was carried out by Nazi and Italian fascist air forces at the request of General Franco. This painting is a scream against repression, death, and the lies that demand blood in the name of order and power.

But now this image is displayed in a place that turns it into decoration for a war room, not a lesson. The Islamic Republic—the same regime that officially sends drones and missiles to Russia to be used in its invasion of Ukraine—also claims to support the people of Palestine. Yet in practice, not even one of those same drones that destroy Kharkiv has been used to stop the genocide in Gaza.

Can this exhibition of Guernica under such conditions be anything other than a mockery of truth? How can you talk about people’s suffering while producing and exporting the tools that cause it?

And the contradiction doesn’t end there. The Islamic Republic’s global allies—Russia and China—who claim to challenge Western domination, both made billions of dollars in trade with Israel in 2024. China, while suppressing media and keeping moral silence, buys cheap oil, sells technology, and maintains scientific and military cooperation with Israel. Russia—now playing the role of General Franco in our time—not only coordinates with Israel in Syria but has never once taken an independent stance against the massacre of Palestinians.

Everything has been turned upside down. Picasso, who painted Guernica in anger over fascist crimes, is now being appropriated by regimes that are themselves expressions of that same death-driven logic. Fascism is not only about violence—it’s about reversing truth, repeating lies until they become part of public memory. Until those who send missiles to Ukraine use anti-bombing art as political decoration.

Guernica in Tehran is not just a painting. It’s a warning—a warning about how fascism steals art, language, empathy, and even protest itself, and turns them into shields for crime. Just as it kills truth in order to survive.