Liberty Leading the People Defaced!

Liberty Leading the People by Eugene Delacroix

CRAZY NEWS just happened. On February 9, 2013, Eugene Delacroix’s, Liberty Leading the People by Eugene Delacroix, has been vandalized. According to Dave Itzkoff, author at the NY Times, a woman is "accused of writing on the artwork and that any damage to it may be easily removed." (Itzkoff, 2013)

“Just before the museum’s closing time on Thursday, BBC News said, a 28-year-old woman wrote graffiti at the bottom of the painting and was stopped by a security guard. A local prosecutor told Agence France-Presse that the woman, whose name was not given, seemed “unstable” and would be given a psychiatric examination.”       -Itzkoff, 

   The painting created by Delacroix, was made in the celebration of the July Revolution of 1830, which overthrew Charles X of France. As she holds the flag of the French Revolution in one hand and a musket on the other, the woman whose lady parts are exposed, symbolizes Liberty leading the people forward, over the lifeless bodies that have fallen.  The painting has been seen as a marker to the end of the Age of Enlightenment, as many scholars see the end of the French Revolution as the start of the romantic era (Renwick, 1990).

  And guess what neoclassical sculpture was inspired by this painting? Just guess. That’s right, it was the Statue of Liberty. The statue of Liberty in New York City, which was gifted from the French, is a universal symbol of freedom and democracy. The statue which holds a torch on one hand, is a more modest take to the one compared to the painting (NPC 2013). 

   

 

 Another outcome of this inspirational painting comes from the British alternative band, Coldplay. Their fourth album, includes the painting as their own cover, and was slightly personalized by including their album name by using a white paint brush to draw “VIVA LA VIDA.” So now every time I come across upon Delacroix’s painting all I hear is “Viva la Vida” by Coldplay. (BBC News)

Itzkoff, Dave. "Delacroix's €˜Liberty Leading the People'€™ Is Defaced in France." ArtsBeat Delacroixs Liberty Leading the People Is Defaced in France Comments. NY Times, 8 Feb. 2013. Web. 09 Feb. 2013.

BBC News. "Coldplay Viva La Vida Or Death & All His Friends Review.". BBC, n.d. Web. 09 Feb. 2013.

Renwick, William Lindsay (1889). The Rise of the Romantics 1789-1815: Wordsworth, Coleridge, and Jane Austen / W. L. Renwick. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990, c1963

NPC. "Statue of Liberty." National Park Service. N.p., n.d. Web. 9 Feb. 2013.