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Art is meant to evoke specific feelings in its audience. Through art, an artist intends to cause a stir in its audience; or perhaps, to inflict a change on society. Often times, art is repurposed or redone by other artists, in order to change the meaning of the original piece. An example of this can be seen through Crucifixion by Matthias Grünewald and Jesus Christ with Shopping Bags by Banksy. While Grünewald’s painting was originally intended to bring hope to those inflicted with a terrible disease, Banksy’s is intended to criticize society for commercializing the Christmas season and tainting the Christian values.
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The Crucifixion was painted as a symbol of Jesus’s suffering in the 1500s. Matthias Grünewald’s piece was actually a part of a much larger work, known as Isenheim Altarpiece (Encyclopaedia Britannica). Grünewald created this piece during the Renaissance period for a group of monk brothers called the Brothers of Saint Anthony. These brothers, more commonly known as the Antonites, were a medieval order of monks that cared for people who were suffering from ergotism, more commonly known as “St. Anthony’s Fire,” an untreatable skin disease that attacked the central nervous system and caused sores, rashes, hallucinations, and eventual death. The monks created temporary hospitals at all of the major trade centers across Europe in order to give those struggling with Saint Anthony’s fire a peaceful and safe place to live their final days (Hickson). Grünewald’s massive altarpiece was created to be an object of devotion in a hospital that was built by the brothers in Isenheim, in order to give the dying patients something to bring them peace. Grünewald painted the piece in an otherworldly, eerie style not typical of the Crucifixion images of the time. In the painting, Jesus is seen dying on the crucifix, writhing in pain and covered in sores. Although the painting appears to be incredibly unsettling and in some ways terrifying, it was actually intended to have the opposite effect. Grünewald believed that by showing Jesus in such agony, the dying patients at the hospital could take comfort in knowing that their lord suffered in a way very similar to how they did (The Columbia Encyclopedia).
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Grünewald used the colors and lighting of the painting to symbolize the suffering of Jesus throughout His crucifixion and to bring comfort to the patients of the hospital. Very different from the typical Crucifixion image of the time, Grünewald depicted his image as a night time event. He shows St. John the Evangelist comforting the Virgin Mary, and St. John the Baptist is seen across from the two, which was not usually depicted in Crucifixion images (Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia). John the Baptist is pointing at the dying Christ and holding a scroll that states, “he must increase, but I must decrease.” This means that although Jesus was dying, which would appear to be a decrease in life, he was actually increasing because he was bringing on eternal life to all, according to Christian belief. Not only that, but the portion of the scroll that states “I must decrease” means that humans must decrease their own self esteems in order to fully appreciate and become one with Jesus, in order to enjoy eternal life. This would have been comforting to the patients in the hospital because it would remind them that although they were dying, they were being rewarded with eternal life in Jesus. St. Sebastian is also at the scene, known as a “plague saint” because his body was riddled with arrow wounds. He symbolizes the patients, whose bodies were covered in scars and scabs from their disease. St. Sebastian’s presence would remind the patients that although they felt alone in death, they were actually walking through the journey of death with Jesus. St. Anthony the Abbot, a saint known for miraculously healing people, is seen in the image that was adjacent to the Crucifixion on the altarpiece. His presence is significant because it would give the patients hope that they could have a miraculous recovery, despite the slim chances of that actually occurring. They would be able to take comfort in the knowledge that there was a possibility for them to be saved. Grünewald used distorted proportions, lighting, and color in order to express the physical and emotional torment that Jesus was clearly facing as he died on the cross. The background of the painting is almost entirely black, with the exception of some hints of green and red. This darkness allows the majority of the focus to be on the image of the dying Jesus and the characters that surround him. It emphasizes the emotional darkness and despair of all of the figures in the image by drawing the viewer’s eye into the lighter aspects of the painting, allowing for the viewer to see the agony on all of their faces. The warm colors that adorn the other characters in the image also serve to draw in the viewer’s eye to the center of the image, in order for them to fully see, appreciate, and relate to them. The suffering of not only Christ but of all of the characters in the painting was a point of identification for the hospital patients, because they could relate to the agony and suffering that Jesus and the others were facing.
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![]() The second image, Banksy’s Jesus Christ with Shopping Bags, satirizes the change of Christian values, especially regarding Christmas, in today’s society. Banksy is an anonymous graffiti artist, painter and film director based out of England. The vast majority of his work involves political satire, and he often spray paints his work in public places. In his work Jesus Christ with Shopping Bags, created in stencil in 2005, shows Jesus wearing a halo on the crucifix. He is holding shopping bags in his hands, containing packaged gifts, toys, candy, and champagne. The entirety of the image is black in white with the exception of the gifts, which are highlighted with red ribbons, and Jesus appears to be melting off of the cross.
In this stencil work, Banksy is criticizing the way society has commercialized Christmas and made it into a season of profit rather than focusing on Christian values and family. Created in an era where many believed that God was “dead” but continues to celebrate religious holidays, Banksy is calling society out on their hypocrisy by combiningtwo opposing ideas—Jesus Christ and material goods (Puszta). He shows through the gifts in Jesus’s hands that Christmas has become a season of self gratification through the exchanging of gifts, rather than a time of spending time with family and celebrating love and compassion, as Jesus’s life represented. Similarly to Grünewald’s Crucifixion piece, the majority of the work is almost entirely devoid of color, with the exception of the red ribbons on the gifts. This splash of color is again intended to draw emphasis on the image of the gifts, and to really accentuate the main idea of the piece—that Christmas is no longer focused Jesus or Christian values, but rather the exchange of presents and material items. By forcing the audience to focus on the gifts in the painting, Banksy draws attention to how society essentially forces us to pay more attention to the gift exchange and material aspect of Christmas rather than what the true meaning of the season is. Not only that, but the gifts hide the fact that Jesus had nails in his hands, suggesting that it is actually the consumerism of the holiday that has killed him rather than the violence of the nails (Richardson). The melting of Jesus off of the cross symbolizes how fleeting the worth of material objects is. Just as Jesus is melting off of the cross, the supposed worth of material objects also melts away eventually, as the objects grow old and lose value (StencilRevolution). Image Credit |
The image of a crucifix is not typically a Christmas image, which could potentially lead to confusion regarding the Christmas presents. However, Banksy chose to depict this image on a crucifix rather than a typical Christmas scene because of what the crucifixion of Christ represents. For Christians, and all of those who celebrate Christmas, Christ’s crucifixion represents the ultimate sacrifice: Jesus giving his life for the salvation of others. In choosing to manipulate an image of Jesus dying on the cross rather than a typical Christmas symbol, Banksy shows that people in today’s society are sacrificing their happiness and values in order to gain more material items. These sacrifices will eventually prove to be worthless, however, because the joy and satisfaction brought on by material objects is fleeting and will not last forever. Had Banksy chosen to depict a typical Christmas scene, such as a manger image showing Jesus on the day of his birth, the suffering and sadness would not have been shown as accurately. Not only that, but in showing Jesus dying on the cross, Banksy accuses Christians of killing Jesus with their consumer based minds. In addition, although there are hundreds of Renaissance Crucifixion images, Banksy chose to satirize Grünewald’s image due to the symbolism behind it. Grünewald’s image was specifically constructed to show severe suffering and pain. Banksy chose to repurpose this image in order to be able to truly show how the Christians are making Jesus suffer.
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The contrast between these two images clearly shows the difference between the past and present. In the time of Grünewald’s image, the image of Jesus dying on the cross actually brought joy to its audience, who needed to have an image of suffering that they could relate to and be comforted by, knowing that if their lord could get through the pain, so could they. Banksy’s image, however, provides us with an alarming message about the effects of consumerism on our society. Jesus dying while holding presents forces us to question where our values lie. What is more important—the exchange of gifts, or being together and following our morality? By showing Jesus dying due to our skewed values, Banksy makes society responsible for the change in our morality and makes it our responsibility to change it. |