User:RM395/Course/Manypedia/Guernica

For this assignment, I chose to compare articles on Guernica, Picasso's painting, in English and Spanish. Since Guernica is such an important Spanish painting, I wanted to see if there was information in the Spanish article that hadn't made it into the English article.

The two articles are very similar in terms of structure. In terms of interpretation of the painting, I found that while English article had more sources, the Spanish article's interpretations made more sense to me. For example, the English article states that it is generally accepted that the lightbulb in the painting represents the sun. However in the Spanish article, it's suggested that the lightbulb is a symbol of technological advances and their capacity to do harm. Overall, it seems like the Spanish article stays close to Picasso's own words about his art, while the English article collects a variety of art criticism that at some points strays away from Picasso's original commentary. Finally, one glaring omission from the Spanish article is the covering-up of a Guernica copy in the United Nations while Colin Powell gave a space regarding the impending war in Iraq.

In conclusion, I believe the English article will be more helpful for those wanting to learn the history of the painting and the bombing that inspired it. For those more interested in the art and the processes behind the painting, the Spanish article seems to cover this in more depth.

--Katerwaul (talk) 02:39, 25 March 2013 (UTC)