Secretary-General, at Reinstallation Event, Hails Portinari’s ‘War and Peace’ Murals as Call to Action for World Leaders

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks at an event commemorating the reinstallation of Candido Portinari’s War and Peace, at Headquarters, today:

Boa noite!

Thank you so much for joining us at this momentous celebration!  Today we say “welcome home” to two of the most meaningful works that the United Nations is honoured to host.  I thank Ambassador Antonio de Aguiar Patriota and the staff of the Permanent Mission of Brazil for this wonderful event.

War and Peace are more than magnificent works of art.  They are Portinari’s call to action.  Thanks to him, all leaders who enter the United Nations see the terrible toll of war and the universal dream for peace.

I am deeply grateful to Projeto Portinari and the Brazilian Government for the restoration.  I am delighted that in Rio this process was open to the public and that these works were also exhibited in São Paulo, Bello Horizonte and Paris.

I visited Brazil when the murals were there in 2011.  At the time, I said that Brazil had a much more important guest than me.  I meant War and Peace.

As you know, Portinari himself was warned by his doctors to stop working on the murals because he was becoming sick from the lead paint.  But he refused.  He literally gave his life to finish these masterpieces.  He never lived to see them installed.

Please join me in a moment of silence to honour the memory of this visionary artist.  Thank you.

Portinari is no longer alive, but his legacy will live forever at the United Nations.  Let us realize his vision and move from war to peace.

Muito obrigado.

Thank you very much.