Winslow Homer for Today

Three Archetypal Rebels in One Painting 

I first became acquainted with Winslow Homer through his watercolors. My parents went to a show at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and came home with four prints from the museum shop depicting life in the Caribbean, which they got framed and put up on the walls of their apartment. 

I'm still living with those prints. They're in the back bedroom of our apartment at the beach.

I only later learned about Homer's work for Harper's Weekly during the Civil War. He spent a lot of time as an artist-correspondent at or near the front, making illustrations and sending them in for publication in the magazine. 

He also turned to oils and produced a number of remarkable canvases depicting the Union army on campaign. His most famous Civil War painting is the one above, from 1866. Its title is Prisoners from the Front. 

In the painting, Homer presents us with three Confederate soldiers surrendering to a Union officer in 1864. 

The one on the left is a young man who may not know very much and may be a bit disoriented by his current situation, but does definitely know how to pull the trigger on a rifle. Stupid but earnest. 

The one in the middle is an older fellow who believes he is a seer and is probably a bit delusional. An old fanatic.

And the one on the right, in the cavalry uniform, is practicing a sneer. Smart and cynical.

You'll note that they are all staring at the Union officer with hatred in the hearts and on their faces.

I think these archetypes work well for the Confederate army, and I think they work well for the insurrectionists we face today.  I've spent a fair amount of time looking at this painting over the last few months, and I have come up with names for each of the soldiers.  The young man on the left, the one who, as the Jewish service for Passover puts it, is too young even to ask a question, is Kyle Rittenhouse. The old man who belongs in a rocker on a porch and has instead spent the last few years carrying a rifle and firing it occasionally, if not accurately, is Rudy Giuliani. And the young cavalier with the sneer is Josh Hawley.

Of the three, the Hawley archetype is easily the most dangerous. The cavalier is the one who is going to go home and keep fighting. After the Civil War, he won. It took a few years, but he did it. 

Will Josh Hawley also know success? I don't know. I hope not.

Peter Schjeldahl of The New Yorker made Prisoners from the Front the centerpiece of an interesting review of two shows at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2013. To see the story click here.

See also Angry and Ridiculous.