My Kid Could Paint That

Duccio, The Betrayal of Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane, 1308

By HANA AWAD 

Though I don’t know if I believe the story or not, I do see the similarities between the two religions, in that both religions encourage peace. People do not realize that Islam also preaches peace, understanding, and tolerance. “The true servants of the Gracious One are those who walk upon the earth with humility and when they are addressed by the ignorant ones, their response is, Peace” (Quran 25:63). So I didn’t find the answer to what happened to Jesus, but in reading Catholic stories and comparing them to my own faith, I perhaps found something more meaningful.

 

Arkwright's Mill, owned by Richard Arkwright, was a textile mill in Derbyshire on the River Derwent. It had a water frame that made longer cotton warp threads for a textile loom. This mill was used to build house working spinning machines because it spins four spindles of cotton of threads at a time. This new mill created jobs that helped employ people, which created a new economy. 

The sky reflects on the river next to the mill on the upper half of the painting. The darker colors used on the painting give it a gloomy feeling. It seems like the feeling of having to work long, lonely hours is beaming from the dark border around the mill. In the middle of the dark background, the mill sits in a valley. The mill is brighter than the rest of the painting to show the financial hope it brings to the economy. 

This Impressionist piece contains three workers on their knees working tediously to scrape the floors of a bourgeois apartment. The three shirtless men seem to represent a form of masculinity and strength as they are the workforce behind creating such an extravagant setting, but their hunched poses could be hinting at vulnerability and exhaustion instead. The 19th century was filled with wealthy people attempting to impress their snobby friends with baller houses and fancy clothes, which is cool until you realize that their are other guys doing labor jobs for some terrible pay.

The renovation occurring in the apartment also references the modernization of Paris with new technological developments. The city is getting filled with railroad stations, crowded streets, and luxury apartment buildings.

The costs for all these improvements are the hardships of manual labor. The floor scrapings are curled just like the curled men. The aren't in a comfortable position, and the rich would never understand how complex and difficult it is to create what they desire. That's probably why this painting was first rejected, as people did not enjoy how the bodies were portrayed.

Absinthe became popular in late 19th Century Paris, especially in bohemian artist circles. Colloquially called the "Green Fairy," absinthe became a symbol of social defiance and gained opposition from politicians and social conservatives. The alleged hallucinatory substance was eventually banned in many countries.

The sheer scale of Manet's The Absinthe Drinker forces viewers to see a mundane subject in a heroic pose at a size often reserved for portraits of royalty. The man, who is supposedly modeled after a man named Collardet, wears a dark cloak and top hat. Framed by an empty liquor bottle and a half-filled glass of absinthe, he seems to retreat into the shadows. The crumbling wall and dimly lit scene seems to hint at disorder, immorality, chaos, all of which lie in stark contrast to the period's fascination with order. This painting, with its muted and dusty colors, is the epitome of realism. It offers a glimpse of the disorder that balanced out the suffocating regulation and rote nature of factory life.

Richard R. Brettell, author of Modern Art 1851-1929, depicts Pissarro as a dedicated painter of traditional rural life. However, the author also explains how the artist, an anarchist, differentiates himself in the category of rural depiction because of his use of urban art techniques. Brettell explains the artist as seemingly a perfectionist and possibly insecure because Pissarro painted this three times before finally selling it. I believe that Pissarro excluded the sky from this work to remove the subjects from the natural setting and more so resemble a factory as they hunch over in the heat exhaustedly. 

In Friedrich Engels The Condition of the Working Class in England in 1844, he discusses the problems that arise in a growing industrial world. People sacrifice so much of their identity in order to create an ideal. They have to let go of their true selves to fit into this urban world. This loss of uniqueness for conformity distances people from one another.

Engles says that "this isolation of the individual - this narrow-minded egotism - is everywhere the fundamental principle of modern society" (124). The more separate and same you are, the better chance you have of succeeding. The reality is that people have created "the war of all against all" (124). No more are your neighbors your friends, but they are your competition. Those who may still share commonalities have become strangers. This is the way the world works. The city only makes this selfishness worse.

Cruikshank's etching shows commoners at a gathering area, all looking similar and participating in a bland activity. Not only does this show progressing industrialization, but supports Engles observation of sameness as the answer. It shows the wealthier side, the people who have followed the same path. This is the result of how the strong has trampled the weak, a result Engles wrote about. As the world industrializes, the separateness between the rich and poor continues to grow.

A Bar at the Folies-Bergere is considered Manet's last major work. This painting represents one of the most prominent music halls in Paris at the time. We see through the mirror behind the barmaid that the guests (aka the wealthy white people) are enjoying their time, but the expression of the barmaid tells another story. The painting used the mirror to draw a separation between the bourgeoises with the working class, creating an unsettling composition. As prosperous as the place might seem, the music halls were a common place for elites to pick up prostitutes which spark the question of the barmaid's true occupation. She does not have much expression. In fact, she looks very much dead inside to me. Is she worrying what the rest of the night will be like? If you look closely at her reflection in the mirror, you can see that she is talking to a man. What is he there for? Is he there for some unspeakable business trade with this poor barmaid? Or is he only an innocent guest here a drink and a good time?

A Bar at the Folies-Bergere speaks to me as a frustration of separations between social classes and social injustices.  The mirror is almost like a line between reality and a dream. The barmaid is in a hellhole of reality while the others living beyond the mirror are in fancy attire.