Revolution/Revelation
Tomorrow is the big day – will we have new leadership in America? Many in the nation are on edge, worried about a potential difficulty if there is a transition of power. I think of my recent installation Revolution/Revelation that included this digital collage. A palimpsest of 18th Century French Revolutionary painter Jacques Louis David’s famous painting Death of Marat lies beneath the “leaden bed covers” of one of Marat’s adversaries, Madame Roland, found in an Anselm Kiefer installation at MASS MOCA. Anyone connected with the aristocracy (a Girondin) was added to Marat’s hit list and sent to the guillotine for beheading. Roland and other Girondins were beheaded for proposing a constitutional monarchy that would allow for a peaceful transition of power.His assassin, Charlotte Corday, was beheaded for her treasonous act of stabbing him in his bath.
The image of the three stems protruding from the blankets of lead in this photo comes from Kiefer’s ideas about a sunflower. The dead sunflower holds many seeds, that when planted, sprout new life. Let us hope that we can come together peacefully as Americans, and sprout new life, no matter the outcome of the election.
In what world will those seeds sprout new life? Today, your birthday Jan, marks the anniversary of new life for you. I’ll think about your image throughout the day today and—as I sit all day at the polls signing in voters—tomorrow.
Hopes for us all.
Thank you Susan! Working at the polls is a most admirable job. I hope all goes well. Stay masked, stay safe.
Poignant image.
It took me a while to see all the details.
” Let us hope that we can come together peacefully as Americans, and sprout new life, no matter the outcome of the election. As always your work is evocative and timely. Happy Birthday, you have given us all a gift.
Jan,
Thanks for this. Artfully and thoughtfully crafted. Fingers crossed.
This is a wonderfully complex image, takes a while to unpack visually. Knowing what the imagery comes from is sort of like speaking a foreign language that can bypass the cognition and go straight to the gut, or heart, I can’t decide which. I loved that installation of Kiefer’s at Mass Moca. I am looking at this about a month late, but it is nice to be past that gut wrenching uncertainty.
Thank you,. Diana. I, too, am relieved that we will be moving forward very soon.
I am glad that the election turned out as it has, and perhaps we won’t yet have to suffer the sort of confused and bloody upheavals that characterized the French Revolution and its aftermath. But your image of Marat (one of the iconic paintings in my mind) weighted even more by the heaviness of lead, and opposed by the idea of new growth, is not only powerful; it is also visually beautiful. A superb piece of work!