An interesting piece of art from Reddit, but I wanted to hear some discussion about it. Initial reactions and analysis first please!
Art doesn't have to have symbolism, but if you're going for that, you'd best get it right. 1) I can almost guarantee the bodies are from Auschwitz or another concentration camp. That makes them Jews, Poles, Gypsies, homosexuals, the mentally and physically retarded, etc. 2) The stars and colors suggest the American flag, less so the Liberian flag. 3) The kid is of indeterminate gender and age; if it's an image I'm supposed to know, I don't. He or she appears to be touching said stars, possibly pulling one down. The strikingly obvious thing is the kid standing on the bodies. Problem being, the United States fought hard against the Nazis. If we're trying to represent Liberia, it's pretty off-base to use Jews to do it. So what we're left with is the message "America is great for our children because of the Holocaust." …which, uhm, okay. It's a novel perspective, and by "novel" I mean "incorrect." You wanna see how to make the point this image is trying to make? Wanna see it done by pros? Drink deep. This isn't picture doesn't make me uncomfortable because it's a ham-handed, sophomoric attempt at symbolism. It's why most art students never go into art.
I'm not uncomfy. Then again, I spent years looking for a vinyl copy of the Dead Kennedys "Plastic Surgery Disasters" so I could have the 24-page Winston Smith collage book. The sad thing is that it's making me think of "King of Birds" by REM, where Stipe turns Newton's words around: "Standing on the shoulders of giants leaves me cold." It looks so Eighties, too: X-Acto hand work on the outlines, the abrupt lines on the rephotographed limbs, the posterization, the flat colors. I'm not hatin', either -- I miss this style. It makes the viewer feel like it's a snapshot, a slice of an event, instead of a composite. If Peter Max had a political brain, he still couldn't hit this.
It seems to be conveying that America, both in a physical sense and in a ideal sense, is built on the crushed lives and rights of minority and immigrant groups. This springs to mind because I'm taking a American immigration course this semester. I suppose you could interpret this in a number of ways.
I remember seeing this on reddit earlier today. My first reaction was that with the bodies layered and the stars above it resembles the American flag and therefore meant to be patriotic or even antipatrotic in some sense. I think its more towards the latter; if the message was about how far we've come from the sacrifices of soldiers/people then the bodies wouldn't be so haphazardly strewn about. Yellow has no place in the American flag at all, making it seem even more antiAmerican or even anticapitalist. It makes me wonder: who or what is this foreign thing that stands upon the discarded to reach at what could have been touched had they worked together instead of died?
First thing my eyes see is the color yellow. Giant droopy tits and a knee-length skirt reaching out to grab a star they would bump their head on if they walk forward a couple steps... On top of that... Body?! Standing on top of bodies... American children are able to reach the stars by standing upon a mound of dead people. Clever as shit.
I saw this earlier today too. I think it's visually striking and certainly provocative, but to what end? I feel like one could interpret this in a variety of ways, but most strongly that it mixes the ideas of American pragmatism with American idealism. There is hope and despair in the way things are and the future is very much uncertain. It also makes me ask, "what is the goal? what will we do if we ever achieve it?"
Disturbing. Can't think of an image of a child on dead bodies that wouldn't be disturbing to some extent. Yellow being a color of cowardice, possibly someone felt the need to express a very anti-American sentiment in a twisted form of "reach for the stars kids!".
Yes, it is disturbing, but again, I'm not sure whether or not an intent for that quality is present. I'm curious about the color yellow as well. In American and some Western European cultures, the color yellow is representative of cowardice, but if I remember correctly, it used to represent envy, before that emotion was attributed as being green. As b_b says, yellow is the color of the "Support Our Troops" ribbons. What's more supportive of a person than what that person walks on? I'd like to know who created this, even if only for more context.
Initial reactions: I wonder if there are thirteen bodies there, and what's the yellow mean? There are more than 13. More in depth whatever: It seems to me at first glance to be a kind of messed up version of "Standing on the shoulders of giants", except you have a child standing on the bodies of people, perhaps to me making the statement that America and the people, and its future prosperity rely the people they trample upon. It could also be a kind of comment on imperialism perhaps? Where the yellow is a new country about to be a star, part of the US, but at the cost of the red and white stripes, which could symbolize what this country originally stood for? Pessimism, if you didn't get that from the imagery, seems to me to be the thing the creator wants to convey to the viewers. Perhaps the fact that the stripes are jumbled up might also signify a kind of disorder the author feels the country is in, while the stars at the top are the ideal that we strive for, making another comment on a loss of the original purpose in favor of the ideal? As for how I feel? It's a nice painting. I can't say I feel uncomfortable staring at it, even after thinking about the meanings behind it. I mean, I have my reservations about America, and perhaps my interpretation is colored by my own views, but I try not to think too much about politics anymore nowadays. It's a lot like God. A lot of talk and ultimately going nowhere. In the end you just live like a dog or cat. They don't know the concept of God or politics and just live life avoiding it as best as they can. That's not to say you ignore movements that aim to change it, of course. But I suppose if you can avoid that kind of life, the better it is for you. If you can't, then wading in the muddy trenches of politics is a necessity. I wade in it from time to time, I guess.
> perhaps to me making the statement that America and the people, and its future prosperity rely the people they trample upon. It could also be a kind of comment on imperialism perhaps? That's how I interpreted it. Either that, or how the pathway to stars ("freedom" or whatever) is paved with war dead.