Picasso masterpiece goes on display in West Bank

[Jefferson23]

After two years of planning, the most valuable artwork ever displayed in the West Bank makes it through Israeli checkpoints to a small Ramallah art school.

A Palestinian art academy on Monday put on display a $7 million Pablo Picasso masterpiece, the first of its kind in the West Bank.

Picasso's 1943 Buste de Femme is on loan from the Van Abbe museum in Eindhoven, Holland. Organizers said they had to overcome a lack of reliable transport and several Israeli checkpoints along the way.

The art director of the Palestinian academy, Khalid Horani, said it took two years to arrange the loan. He said the painting's journey was a story full of details and difficulties.

The small art school in Ramallah put in the loan request in early 2010. Normally, such inter-museum exchanges are routine and take about six months to coordinate.

"Nothing is normal over here," Horani said. "We planned to have an art work here, but found ourselves going through all the political complications."

in full: http://www.haaretz.com/news/national/picasso-masterpiece-goes-on-display-in-west-bank-1.368769

[izquierdista]

1. Guernica would be more appropriate

But their benevolent gatekeepers would never allow that.

[Jefferson23]

2. Interesting idea, but I am glad to hear this take place regardless. n/t