A Sticky Situation: The Sea of Ice

A Sticky Situation
Casper David Friedrich, Sea of Ice, 1823-24
A Sticky Situation: Peril in Painting
Curated By GARY WHITTAKER

The North Western Passage does not exist and now you know, its just shifting ice that will pin in your ship and break its hull into splinters. The towering spires of ice draw the eye to their fractured forms. Only after some time does the eye wonder to the tragedy of the broken ship. In this painting, as in the Arctic, nature is king. The entirety of the subject matter is positioned in the middle third of the painting, emphasized by the lighter color and the clouds breaking above. This is one of Friedrich's greatest works, a foreshadowing of what the German identity would become.


Before the Franco-Prussian War, Germans were perceived as sign-song romantics, and for good reason; the most notable works of art from the romance period came from German hands. Poems, fairy tales, and paintings flowed out of Germany like Panzers into France. This image of German would be forgotten soon, Bismark and his Prussian staff would transform Germany into the Regimented Militaristic Society it has the reputation of today. Fredric's work sits on the boarder, it both romances and creates the image of destruction.
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A Sticky Situation: Relief of The Light Brigade

A Sticky Situation
Richard Caton Woodville, Relief of The Light Brigade, 1897
A Sticky Situation: Peril in Painting
Curated By GARY WHITTAKER

Charge, charge noble 600. No wait not over there, over there (pointing to set of cannons on the other side of the valley). Blast, they've charged at the wrong guns.

That was, in brief, what happened during that fateful Crimean day. Although, what can be expected of serving under inbred fools who purchased their commissions in the Royal Army? But, let us venture into analysis of the painting at hand. It follows the typical military hero painting guide: Cavalry, check. Heroic hand gestures, check. Stupid looking death faces, check. An inflated sense of what actually occurred, CHECK. The main purpose of this type of art is to commemorate a person or event of historical note. While the Charge of the Light Brigade did indeed happen, it was little more than a grave military blunder. The real impact came when the dispatches reached London. Public outrage at the officers involved soared as did celebration of the enlisted men. The Brits sure love a heroic slaughter.

The action of the painting revolves around the two horsemen in the center. One a British hussar, the other a Russian artilleryman. The white horse of the Brit forces the viewer to look at the one non-earth toned object in sight. Remain parts of the painting are rather dull, perhapase= good for funny little captions, but now is not the time to do so.
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A Sticky Situation: Tornado Over Kansas

A Sticky Situation
J.S. Curry, Tornado Over Kansas, 1929
A Sticky Situation: Peril in Painting
Curated By GARY WHITTAKER

"Go West" they said. "Everything is great out there,"they said. Well, looks like you didn't go West enough to escape tornadoes. So now your stuck in a flat desolate, soon to be dust bowl, where even the wind is trying to kill you. But you endure, you are the hardscrabble of America and its your job to make sure those soft handed bankers and city folk on the coasts have food to eat. There is probably some poem celebrating the glory of farmers I could quote, but I'll spare you.

Artistically, thematically, and subject-wise, John Steuart Curry is similar to Benton. The faces differ, as Benton's are less defined, Curry's have more depth and are fully seen. Curry's work also possesses the bending pattern of Benton. This comes as no surprise. Benton, Curry and Grant Wood are all hailed as the heroes of Midwestern Regionalism. An interesting note on Curry's artistic life is its similarity to Norman Rockwell's. Both did illustrations for various magazines, even working on Boy's Life and The Saturday Evening Post during similar periods.
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A Sticky Situation: Into the Storm

A Sticky Situation
Buchheim, Into the Storm,  1941
A Sticky Situation: Peril in Painting
Curated By GARY WHITTAKER
The storm is the least of your worries, while the North Atlantic has earned its reputation for storms that rival the biblical deluge of Noah, the Royal Navy still controls the surface. With His Royal Majesty's Navy guarding shipping on the surface, you must descend into the black waters to continue your fight. When a ship is spotted the Captain orders a dive to torpedo depth, at twenty meters depth the pressure on the hull is merely three times what it is on the surface. Hopefully the ship chasing you is not sonar equipped, but if it is the never ceasing sonar pings will have you on the brink of madness. *PING*... *PING* ... *PING* You must sit in silence, even the slightest sound could betray your position to the set of English ears listening to a hydrophone. When, when not if, you are found the enemy will start dropping depth charges in an attempt to blast you out of the water. These depth charges are simply bombs designed to detonate at a pre-selected depth, the water amplifies the blast resulting in misses still causing catastrophic damage. The only hope of escape lies in going deeper. The submarine plunges deeper and deeper, the pressure hull groaning against the water pressing in, already leaks have sprung from pipes soaking the crew inside. A dive can only happen for so long, at the quarter kilometer mark the worst can happen. 250 meters is the theoretical limit, calculated in a design bureau in Berlin and almost never actually tested. Should the worst happen, the water filled tanks used to control buoyancy will be unable to evacuate the water stored inside. With no way to evacuate the tanks, the submarine will continue it descent unstopped. Eventually the pressure hull will give way under 30 times the normal atmospheric pressure flooding the submarine. Perhaps the ship will hit bottom first, stranding the crew on the seabed, waiting to succumb to oxygen deprivation. That is all in your potential future, don't worry about it know. Just get through this storm.

By the way, good hunting.
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