100 days painting — design reflection

Admiring famous painting has always been an important part of my life. The story behind painting itself and the painter gives me a lot of thoughts, which later often turn into my design inspiration. So, I decide to do this little project, one painting at a day, about 2 minutes’ reading. By doing this, I hope I can share some basic background knowledge as well as some color/design techniques about the painting with you. I will also tell you my reflection from this painting in the end (if there is any lol), you are very welcome to share your thoughts if you like.

Day 5 — White Crucifixion

The 1938 painting White Crucifixion represents a critical turning point for the artist Marc Chagall: it was the first of an important series of compositions that feature the image of Christ as a Jewish martyr and dramatically call attention to the persecution and suffering of European Jews in the 1930s.

In White Crucifixion, his first and largest work on the subject, Chagall stressed the Jewish identity of Jesus in several ways: he replaced his traditional loincloth with a prayer shawl, his crown of thorns with a headcloth, and the mourning angels that customarily surround him with three biblical patriarchs and a matriarch, clad in traditional Jewish garments. At either side of the cross, Chagall illustrated the devastation of pogroms: On the left, a village is pillaged and burned, forcing refugees to flee by boat and the three bearded figures below them — one of whom clutches the Torah — to escape on foot. On the right, a synagogue and its Torah ark go up in flames, while below a mother comforts her child. By linking the martyred Jesus with the persecuted Jews and the Crucifixion with contemporary events, Chagall’s painting passionately identifies the Nazis with Christ’s tormentors and warns of the moral implications of their actions.

That’s basically what I read in The Essential Guide. Amazing Interpretation right?! Since I really like Marc Chagall, so I am trying to explore different themes of his painting in his different period of life. I have covered his love story with Bella, his emotional attachment with his hometown, his friendship with Apollinaire and his sympathy for the jews. These paintings all conveyed different ideas, but I can feel that they share something in common, that is they are all created with love and innocent of the painter.