The crisis of Spain's Civil War in the 1930s sparked varying responses from artists in both Spain and Britain and became the subject of Pablo Picasso's Guernica and Weeping Woman. These paintings were part of an exhibition designed to raise funds and assistance for the Republican cause after the bombing of regions by the Nationalists.
Artists in Britain contributed to the effort and, in 1935, the Artists International Association (AIA) held an exhibition entitled Artists Against War and Fascism. The show featured works by Eric Gill, Augustus John and Barbara Hepworth and the AIA went on to gain support from modernists such as Fernand Léger and László Moholy-Nagy.
Edward Burra visited Spain several times in the 1930s and was deeply affected by the Civil War. The violence and destruction witnessed by Burra had a profound impact on his work. Rather than continuing his imagery of popular culture, paintings concentrating on this period include disturbing scenes of cruelty and torture with references to medieval warfare.
