LONDON—A full-size tapestry replica of Picasso's Guernica will travel from its home in the United Nations building in New York to London's Whitechapel Gallery, the Guardian reports. It will be displayed at Whitechapel's reopening exhibition in April after a £13.5 million gallery ($18.6 million) renovation.

The work was commissioned by the late Norman Rockefeller and placed on long-term loan at the UN by his widow, Margaretta Rockefeller. German sculptor Isa Genzken will use it as the centerpiece of her show, the first at the revamped Whitechapel, to remind viewers of the almost-forgotten fact that the original Guernica was displayed at the gallery in 1939, the only time it was seen in Britain.

Guernica, one of the most famous anti-war images in the world, was painted by Picasso in 1937 in response to the horrors of the Spanish civil war. It now resides at the Reina Sofia museum in Madrid, too fragile to travel.

The Guernica tapestry faced a bit of controversy itself when, in February 2003, it was covered with a curtain for an address by Colin Powell to the UN. Powell's representatives claimed at the time that the then U.S. secretary of state wanted a less distracting backdrop for video and photographs, but it was later reported that advisers worried about Powell being recorded in front of such a famously anti-war image.