Made in Obama's Image

In my previous posts on Obama art, I have drawn attention to the blend of religion and politics that the artists express, the religion centering on the political figure himself.

Michael J. Lewis makes the same connection in his essay, "The Art of Obama Worship" in Commentary (September 2009).

What is striking about these paintings is not their quality, about which the less said the better, but their consistent tone. They belong to that class of objects known as “devotional art.” Such objects are not only intended as votive offerings, to serve as the focus of veneration; the actual process of making them is itself an act of piety, a consideration that all but places them outside the realm of aesthetic judgment.

Lewis takes us through a recent history of the intersection of art with politics, from the Vietnam War through the art wars of the 1980s to Bush Baiting most recently. He then discusses Shepard Fairey, Ron English, and Shawn Barber, but dwells at length on the Fairey's career and the powerful effect of his Hope poster, recently acquired by the National Portrait Gallery.

He concludes, saying, "...there is something unsettling about images that offer little more political commentary than an uncomplicated adulation that borders on power worship. By showing the subjects removed from all political context, and in a beatific reverie, such art produces images that are aesthetically indistinguishable from the “dear leader” effigies that delighted the dictators of the 1930s or of our own day."

Harold adds:

Great posts David; this is a hugely important and amazing development to watch unfold, with its undeniable connection with fascist and totalitarian propoganda techinques. The hard left has always leaned that way--they admire everything they know about Lenin, Stalin, Che, Castro, Chavez...all of whom knew (know) and exploit(ed) the power of iconic images in their propoganda.

Bill Whittle at PJTV has this video piece suggesting conservatives had better get with the program in understanding the importance of images...recall that Socrates said political philosophy has need of images, and in fact that he himself was "greedy" for images.

More Obama Apotheosis

"Fountain of Hope," by Ron Keas

Here we go again. More apotheosis of Barack Obama. More elevation of the sitting President to divine status.

The New York Times, under the auspices of simply reporting on what's happening out there, gives us yet another spread of Obama celebration art ("Obama's Face (That's Him?) Rules the Web," May 30, 2009). (Of course, I am also publicizing these things in my own small way, but you know where I stand on the matter.) One of the paintings is just dreadful. Perhaps the title of the article recognizes that. "Team Player" is just trite. It depicts Obama in a D.C. basketball uniform wearing #1.

Get it? Sure you do.

There is also one that is quite good ("Looking Presidential" by Mimi Torchia Boothby) with his wedding ring figuring prominently on his pensively and prayerfully placed hand.

Then there is the man in the white suit. What does Ron Keas have in mind with "Fountain of Hope?" In the background is the White House in front of which is a fountain of white water, in front of which stands Barack Obama dressed entirely in white: suit and shirt, but no tie. My wife's first reaction was that he does not look like an American President. American Presidents don't wear white suits. As usual, she put her finger on the central disturbing point. He looks like a Central or South American dictator. Even facially, he looks like a thin Hugo Chavez. And of course, this glorification by art is what they do with their leaders in dictatorships.

The apotheosis is in the phrase "Fountain of Hope." God, according to the well-known hymn, is the "fount of every blessing." The image of a fountain or spring is that of an inexhaustible supply of blessing, in particular of water, the means of life, and thus figuratively of life itself. Psalm 36:9 says, "For with you (the Lord) is the fountain of life; in your light we see light."

I thought perhaps that the artist intended to criticize either the President or his followers with this painting. But, no. Ron Keas is just a terrible painter. See for yourself at keasart.com. He has a whole series of hagiographic paintings of the next re-founder of our republic. He also does Marilyn Monroe and Elvis.

Ecce Obama

You cannot avoid having to deal with Jesus. The Roman governor who condemned Jesus to death, asked the crowd what everyone must ask himself: "What shall I to do, then, with Jesus who is called Christ?" (Matthew 27:22). Islam attempted to become the world religion, but in the Koran there is a background contention with Jesus. Modern political philosophy is a response to, and an attempt to overcome, the claims of Christ and the working out of them in history. Francis Bacon, the founder of and chief apologist for modern science knew that he had to displace the Christian hope if people were fully to embrace science as the fount from which all blessings flow. The modern political monster, Marxism, is secularized Christian eschatology (insofar as it can conceivably be secularized). The other great bookend of political philosophy, Friedrich Nietzsche, put his hope in the rise of an Ubermensch, a world recreating, heroic, suffering servant. Were there Christian themes in Nazism? I would be surprised to find there weren't. The North Korean ideology is a political gospel modeled on the Christian gospel, with Kim Jong Il in the role of the Son.

Now here are the most ardent Obama supporters casting their political hero explicitly in the form of Christ the Savior. As Jesus referred to himself as "the way, the truth and the life" (John 14:6 NIV), the artist entitles the painting, "The Truth." It is to be unveiled on President Obama's 100th Day in Office by Michael D'Antuono at Union Square in Manhattan.

For those who are totally illiterate biblically, let me point out that Obama has his arms extended with open palms in a way that mimics Jesus hanging on the cross, but with no expression of agony, suggesting that he is already dead. Perhaps D'Antuono is just not as good an artist as his benefactors think he is.

On his head sits a crown of thorns. Again, the Apostle Matthew tells us, "The the governor's soldiers took Jesus into the Praetorium and gathered the whole company of soldiers around him. They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and then they wove a crown of thorns and set it on his head" (Matthew 27:27-29).

When Jesus died on the cross after many hours of tortuous suffering, "At that moment, the curtain of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom" (Matthew 27:51). God used this miracle (it tore from the top, not the bottom) to indicate that, by his atoning death on the cross, Jesus had purchased access for God's people into God's holy presence. The curtain that had separated worshippers from the Holy of Holies was no longer necessary for anyone who would approach God in faith with his sins cleansed by the blood of Christ (Heb. 4:14-16; 10:19-22). Clearly what Obama is depicted as doing in this painting is giving the American people access to presidential power.

The Letter to the Hebrews in the New Testament directs the Christian believer's attention from what Jesus accomplished by the cross to "the hope we profess, for he who promised is faithful" (Hebrew 10:23). The Apostle John tells us what he promised: "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die." Barack Obama promised us "hope." The hope that this artist sees the new President bringing us, however, is fleeting, illusory, and ambiguous at best by comparison. Obama also promised us change. But Jesus died and rose again so that people could "be changed" (1 Corinthians 15:51; Ezekiel 36:26). He came to raise the spiritually dead to life and recreate us, renewing our hearts in love.

The puzzle of the painting, as I see it, is in what the artist sees as the President's suffering and sacrifice. In what sense is he laying down his life for us? The press adores him and he appears to be having a really good time. His popular approval rating are still quite high. So where's the suffering servant? Does Michael D'Antuono anticipate an Lincolnian end for this President? That is a horrible thought, but not nearly as horrible as a painting that anticipates (one dreads to say "hopes for" in some perverse way) such a national tragedy.

I say once again that President Obama, especially if he is in any sense a Christian, needs to rebuke his followers for this sort of spiritual blasphemy and political lunacy. But I suspect that he won't because evidence of fanatical following supports him politically, and part of him may just believe the adulation. If these suspicions are correct, I fear that he is in for a terrible crash. I just pray that he does not bring the country down with him in the process.

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Update 4/29/2009:
D'Antuono has canceled the Union Square showing. You can read his statement here.

He told Culture Monster at the LA Times, "I canceled the showing out of respect for religion. It was not meant to offend so many people. I don't think it would be helpful to the cause of unity to show it."

So it seems he is no Andres Serrano. He's just confused. For example, he also told The LA Times, "It was supposed to provoke political dialogue. I wanted to start a discussion. Is Obama being crucified by the right? Do people think he's the next savior?"

Are we in any need of provocation for political dialogue on Barack Obama? If it is civil dialogue you want, you have to be fairly deeply embedded in the Obama-crazed arts "community" to think that a painting like this one would accomplish such dispassionate conversation. Also, what fair-minded person thinks that the right is "crucifying" the President? But I suppose they are, if ordinary political opposition counts.

The Art of Politics in the Age of Obama

I continue to be amazed by the way artists took up Barack Obama as a theme for their work. Most artists would position themselves on the political left, and thus would be more inclined to the Democratic Party than to the GOP. But we have never seen a political candidate inspire such artistic productivity as Obama has. Even before he was sworn in as President, there was enough material fill a Barack Obama Museum of Art, or rather a Museum of Barack Obama Art.

Here is an interesting recent display, though it may simply be another Abu Graib atrocity.

Magazine covers could be another post entirely.


The most striking adoration of the Bam has been in political posters, however. Consider the effect of these. This one is a more traditional political poster, but very well done.


These posters, by contrast, are not traditional.


These two seem to me to bring out the candidate's African heritage quite strikingly.




This last one suggests that the candidate is a spiritually exceptional person, a prophet, or perhaps even a divine being.

These do not feature Obama's face, but they are beautiful and at the same time troubling in their Utopian promise.



Senator Obama's unwaveringly leftist voting record together with the fainting hysteria surrounding him personally produced a talented response from the more conservative, or at least more politically skeptical, artists. This one places him on the far left.


This one on the far right. (Of course, the left and right converge at some point. The rightist Adolf Hitler was a National Socialist.)


This one, alluding to a recently popular film, mocks Obama's political inexperience.


The best known poster has been Shepard Fairey's "Hope" poster. The same poster also appears with "Progress" as the caption. Fairey's model was this Mannie Garcia AP photo. The Associated Press is suing Fairey over the use of their image.


And here is The Poster.

Fairey appears to have used a Communist genre of political poster art as his inspiration. Here is the Russian Bolshevik, Vladimir Lenin.


Here is Cuba's iconic Che Guevara.


This socialist/communist connection is becoming increasingly relevant as the Obama administration leads the government in nationalizing, taking charge of, and redesigning most of the country's economy.

It is a tribute to the Fairey poster that it has become the model for a growing number of parodies. There are these, for example, that are critical of Obama himself. "Obey" is likely the best-known of the parodies.



There are many other variations. Some are racist, some are just in bad taste, and some just aren't funny, as far as I can tell. These are a few of the wittier ones. They go in various directions, all playing on the word "Hope," but the last two using the "Change" mantra as a take off point.




Finally, as President Obama stumbles and wrecks his way to what he tells us will be a just society and a vibrant economy, the Reagan variation stands as a continuing reminder that there are principles of political and economic liberty that are also principles of political and economic flourishing, and they are...


You can go to Rene Wanner's page to find her collection of 149 Fairey themed posters that she assembled the day after the 2008 election, including the Soup Nazi, Jeremiah Wright, and More Cowbell. Of course, the number has grown since then.

Laying fun aside, this artistic aspect to the 2008 Obama campaign should put every lover of republican liberty on guard. Up to this point, it has only been in totalitarian countries that we have seen a political leader's face celebrated so artistically and plastered so ubiquitously. It is the sort of personality cult that is incompatible with a modern republic structured around a constitutional separation of powers. If he is the One, if he is the Dawn, if he is both the exemplar and the source of moral and political progress, then the separation of powers, which is premised on the recognition of human moral frailty and political epistemological skepticism, becomes inherently unjust. Start researching "the Hugo Chavez political model."

Wendell Phillips said that "eternal vigilance is the price of liberty." This artistic expression of what is arguably the first "personality cult" in American politics does not constitute President Obama as a totalitarian, but it does prompt the wise to view his every attempt at concentrating political and economic power in Washington with a heightened and aggressive scrutiny.

Baby, It's Cold Outside!

Hunters in the Snow by Pieter Bruegel the Elder (1525-1569)

Those of you across the Northern tier of the nation know you're about to get another bracing blast of Arctic air. As you hunker down to weather the latest offering from the warming planet in front of a fireplace, wood stove, kitchen range, camp stove, or just wrapped in a blanket with your sweetie, here are some things to consider. Viv Forbes, a geologist and mineral economist out of Queensland Australia, has an informative piece on the current cycle of climate change, "Climate Change in Perspective". I reproduce his conclusions here, but I urge you to read the whole thing--it's one of the clearest and best treatments of the current hysteria about CO2 emissions pushing us past some tipping point of high temperature, beyond which we can never recover. Common sense and every bit of the geological record argue against the proposition. Instead, it is more than likely that we are heading into another sustained period of serious cold, not unlike the "Little Ice Age" of 1400-1900, which, in geological time, was just a couple of minutes ago.

Dr Forbes concludes:

• There is no global warming crisis. The world is just emerging from the Little Ice Age – so naturally temperatures will be above those of last century.
  
• There is nothing unusual about today’s temperature levels or their trends. There were several periods since the Big Ice Age ended that had temperatures above the present.
  
• Man’s emissions of carbon dioxide are beneficial not dangerous. And current levels of CO2 are low by historical standards. All life would benefit from an increase in CO2 content.
• Extreme weather events are a permanent feature of the world’s climate. Weather extremes occur at any time and in all climate phases. All we can do is “Be Prepared”.
• Humans cannot control the climate or the weather. They must learn to adapt to whatever the future holds, or, like the dinosaurs that ruled the world for far longer than humans have done, disappear and be listed among the long list of species extinguished by climate change.
• “Climate Change” is the natural condition on earth – climate and weather are never still. If we have anything to fear from “Climate Change” it is not warming, whose effects are almost wholly beneficial. What we need to fear is a return of the cold, dry, hungry ice ages.
• It is clear that the theory that carbon dioxide causes dangerous global warming is false. It predicted increasing warming as the CO2 content rose. But temperatures fell, twice in the last 100 years. Now in another fraudulent about face they will try to say that man’s CO2 is now causing the cooling. In other words, no matter what happens, they will adjust the theory to claim it proves their failed thesis. This is pseudo science.
• An alternative theory that phases in climate are affected by solar cycles has been proved to largely agree with observations. Those forecasts came before the event suggesting that the theory may be correct.
• There is no need whatsoever for an economically dangerous, and scientifically discredited, "Emissions Trading Scheme" with its taxes, bureaucracy and disruptions

Another interesting article is "Earth on the Brink of an Ice Age," and a very useful site for both warmists and us deniers is climatedebatedaily.com, which offers the latest and best work on both sides.

For a highly entertaining literary treatment of life in an ice age, read Mark Helprin's amazing Winter's Tale, a tale of a winter in New York City in the mode of "magical realism". Helprin is also a Senior Fellow at the Claremont Institute for Statesmanship and Political Philosophy, and a very sharp guy. Always read anything he writes.

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Innes adds: I had never heard of this "Little Ice Age." Flemish artist Pieter Bruegel (1525-1569) was the first to feature these severe winters in his paintings, completing seven of them in two years, including "Hunters in the Snow." I added the painting above.

Prof. Scott Mandia at SUNY Suffolk, writes:

Western Europe experienced a general cooling of the climate between the years 1150 and 1460 and a very cold climate between 1560 and 1850 that brought dire consequences to its peoples. The colder weather impacted agriculture, health, economics, social strife, emigration, and even art and literature. Increased glaciation and storms also had a devastating affect on those that lived near glaciers and the sea.

Impact on Agriculture: Lamb (1966) points out that in the warmest times of the last 1000 years, southern England had the climate that northern France has now. For example, the difference between the northern-most vineyard in England in the past and present-day vineyard locations in France is about 350 miles. In other terms that means the growing season changed by 15 to 20 percent between the warmest and coldest times of the millennium. That is enough to affect almost any type of food production, especially crops highly adapted to use the full-season warm climatic periods. During the coldest times of the LIA, England's growing season was shortened by one to two months compared to present day values. ... Each of the peaks in prices corresponds to a particularly poor harvest, mostly due to unfavorable climates with the most notable peak in the year 1816 - "the year without a summer." One of the worst famines in the seventeenth century occurred in France due to the failed harvest of 1693. Millions of people in France and surrounding countries were killed....

Mer de Glace, by Samuel Birmann (1793-1847), soon after the Alpine glacier had reached its maximum extent

And this pattern of climate change, though it had nothing to do with big American cars, seems to have been quite influential in one of the most dramatic turns in Western history, the French Revolution.

One of history's most notorious quotes might have been due in part to a rare extremely warm period during the LIA. In northern France in 1788, after an unusually bad winter, May, June, and July were excessively hot, which caused the grain to shrivel. On July 13, just at harvest time, a severe hailstorm (which typically occurs when there is very cold air aloft) destroyed what little crops were left. From that bad harvest of 1788 came the bread riots of 1789 which led to Marie Antoinette's alleged remark "Let them eat cake," and the storming of the Bastille.

So Viv Forbes's warning that "What we need to fear is a return of the cold, dry, hungry ice ages" is a real attention grabber.

Doodling on Duty

The incoming president is facing tough tests in the economy, social policy, and international affairs. A President cannot disregard any sphere of responsibility. He cannot forgo understanding the economy (John McCain). He cannot pretend that the wider world is no longer of any importance (Bill Clinton in '93). And he cannot think that posterity will not judge his artistic abilities.

Here is Obama's doodle from one of the few moments he found himself in the U.S. Senate

This fetched $2,075 at auction. The market has spoken. What will history say?

And then there's the Reagan test. Can he doodle like the Gipper?

By the way, if you cannot recognize Obama's subjects (that would say something!), they are (L-R, not politically), Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY), Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), Sen. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), and Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-MA).

Dogs Playing Poker: A Friend in Need

For any of my readers who think that I am all about the Good and the True with nothing to say about the Beautiful, let me remind you that I have previously posted on great Art. In fact, my post on "You Been Farming Long?" gets a steady stream of visitors from around the country. Given the interest in this form of folk art, I thought I would provide a post on Cassius Marcellus "Cash" Coolidge (1844-1934) of Antwerp, New York, in upstate. He is the fellow who struck upon the novel idea of painting dogs who are playing cards, the most famous of whose works is "A Friend in Need." He shows dogs of several breeds around a card table playing five card stud. By the early hours of the morning, the two dogs in the foreground have almost all the chips, but the viewer of the painting can see that they have accomplished this by cheating. The cigar smoking bulldog is passing an ace to his friend by his toes.

This is funny because dogs do not have opposable thumbs and so they cannot hold the cards. Nor can they count. You see? Genius. Of course, this is also true of cats, but cats are not funny. Dogs are funny because they are comically ugly. You might say that cows are comically ugly and do not have opposable thumbs (as Gary Larson once astutely observed). Could he have used cows? No. Cows all look the same, whereas dogs come in all shapes and sizes, just as we do, so we can see ourselves in the dogs and laugh without the pain of looking at ourselves too directly.

If you would like to know more about Coolidge, who was a very interesting fellow from an interesting time, see www.dogsplayingpoker.com. The Dogs Playing Poker website also tells us:

Coolidge first began his career as a professional artist by creating artwork for local cigar companies that used his paintings for "lithographed box covers or inner box lids." ...His break, however, came in 1903 when he signed a contract with the advertising company Brown & Bigelow located in St. Paul, Minnesota. Brown & Bigelow was an advertising company that specialized in "remembrance advertising." This type of advertising consists of a business distributing objects branded with a company name and logo to its loyal customers. ...He eventually painted a total of sixteen different paintings of dogs in various situations for Brown & Bigelow.

If you are feeling a bit snobbish toward this masterpiece, you might be interested to know that two of his other works from 1903, "A Bold Bluff" and "Waterloo: Two," sold for $590,400 at Doyle New York's annual Dogs in Art Auction in 2005 (CNNMoney.com, February 16, 2005).