Pablo Picasso's Guernica marks 75th anniversary, gets ‘health check’

PanARMENIAN.Net - Pablo Picasso's Guernica, one of the world's most iconic paintings, is getting a full health check as it marks its 75th anniversary, AP reported.

A giant robotic machine is taking tens of thousands of microscopic shots of the black-and-white anti-war masterpiece to allow experts to penetrate the work like never before and see its real condition after a hectic life traveling the globe.

Madrid's Reina Sofia museum - where "Guernica" is housed - has teamed up with Spanish telecommunication company Telefonica to develop the technology, which uses advanced infrared and ultraviolet photography.

The machine was built so that "Guernica" does not have to make the risky move to a conservation laboratory, where normally such investigative work would be done.

"The painting is in delicate condition given that it has suffered a lot of movement and many alterations," said Jorge Garcia Gomez-Tejedor, the museum's head of conservation. "You could compare it to a major medical checkup in the sense that it needs to be constantly monitored and watched over."