The UN is left without the tapestry of Picasso's 'Guernica'

Donald Trump's UN ambassador, Nikki Haley, in front of the 'Guernica' tapestry, in a 2018 photo.Mary Altaffer / AP

The huge tapestry that represents

Pablo Picasso's

, one of the hallmarks of the United Nations headquarters in New York for decades, will no longer be seen in the access to the room where its highest decision-making body meets. the Security Council, after its owner, the great-grandson of oil magnate John D. Rockefeller - the richest American in history - requested its return.

The work, on loan since 1984, has already been taken down and will no longer remind the leaders and diplomats who visit the United Nations sanctum of the war disasters, as the painter from Malaga intended.

Neither the UN nor the Rockefeller family explained the reasons that led to the removal of the tapestry, commissioned in 1955 by Nelson Rockefeller, the patriarch's grandson, from Jacqueline de la Baume-Durrbach's French workshop, with the authorization of the Spanish artist.

The only thing that is known to be the claimant, Nelson A. Rockefeller Junior, great-grandson of the founder of the dynasty and son of the former –who became vice president of the United States and governor of New York-, “recently notified the United Nations of his intention to get it back ”, Stéphane Dujarric, spokesperson for the institution, announced this Thursday.

"We thank the Rockefeller family for loaning this powerful and iconic work of art for more than 35 years," added the spokesperson.

The original painting, which became a universal symbol against the barbarism and cruelty of war, represents the bombing of the Basque town on April 26, 1937 by German planes from the Condor Legion, which supported the Francoist side during the Spanish Civil War ( 1936-1939).

The textile replica was loaned in 1984 to the UN, which a year later installed it at the access to the agency's command bridge.

Since then, it had only left there for the renovation of the building, between 2009 and 2013, a period in which it was kept at the Rockefeller Foundation.

This Thursday, the wall where the huge textile reproduction of the painting was hung - seven meters long by three meters high - was empty, as confirmed by the spokesperson, which gives rise to the member countries to a race to nominate one of their artists as a substitute.

In 2008 Miquel Barceló inaugurated his particular

in the dome of the UN Palace of Nations in Geneva, a magnum opus - cost 20 million euros - not without controversy.

The agency will study options to replace the void left by the reproduction of Guernica, said the spokesman, after having notified member countries of the return of the work.

In its 75-year history, the UN has amassed a vast collection of canvases and sculptures with messages against violence and for world peace.

An artistic ensemble that brings together as many anecdotes as a diversity of styles, such as a stained glass window by Marc Chagall or murals by Portinari or Vela Zanetti.