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You're correct. A statue such as this one is difficult to interpret correctly unless you're actually standing before the statue, right where the viewer is suppo
by mariodiana 5y ago
You're correct. A statue such as this one is difficult to interpret correctly unless you're actually standing before the statue, right where the viewer is supposed to be standing. A photo taken from a different angle skews the interpretation.
When we look at the photo, the American and African natives have a downcast glance, as if they're subservient. However, the statue was originally placed on high. The photo loses that. From the proper viewing angle, the two natives are meeting the gaze of the viewer. That conveys a completely different message.
They are on foot to make it clear that they are acting as guides, which wouldn't be clear if they were on horseback. Roosevelt is elevated on horseback because Roosevelt is the focus of the work. There is nothing wrong with that.
Roosevelt's gaze goes off to the horizon to convey the fact that he's the explorer here. There is nothing wrong with that.
The controversy is due to woke, self-righteousness, and anti-Western nihilism. If such sentiment is allowed to continue to metastasize, it will destroy civilization. Decent people need to push back.
- tptacek 5y agoNo, the figures flanking Roosevelt are not meant to represent his guides on an Amazon expedition. When it comes both to the American frontier west and the continent of Africa, the word “explore” is doing a lot of interesting work.
- AnimalMuppet 5y ago> No, the figures flanking Roosevelt are not meant to represent his guides on an Amazon expedition. What is your basis for saying this? q1w2 gave their basis for saying that it was about the Amazon expedition; what is your basis for saying that it isn't? Just "no it's not" doesn't work well as a refutation of an argument that had more than that.
- tptacek 5y agoI cited downthread what the figures were intended to mean, along with a source. The Amazon expedition thing seems like a weird just-so story. The real answer doesn't seem as lurid as some of the statue's critics want it to be, but it's still a problematic way to honor Roosevelt. Later Someone even replied to that comment with a cite directly from Fraser. I don't think this is so much in contention. The figures are not Roosevelt's helpers on the Amazon expedition.
- kcplate 5y agoSo do you feel the sculptor was lying when he said who/what those figures represent? That seems to be a bit of an assumption without much evidence. Perhaps you (and others) just disagree with the artist’s interpretation or find meaning where the artist intended something different. That happens a lot in works of art. I guess my perspective is that if the actual guide’s names and likeness that Roosevelt used were lost to history but as a sculptor but you still wanted to honor them…why wouldn’t you generically represent the cultures and races of those that helped him if they were important to the expeditions? That somehow seems less offensive to me than representing them as culturally generic…or not at all.
- tptacek 5y agoI take the sculptor at their word that the figures represent the American frontier and the continent of Africa.