Abu Ghraib Paintings

The first thing I thought when I saw Fernando Botero's painting were that they reminded me of Francisco Goya's Black Paintings. They're similar in their use of dark, neutral shades combined with bold violent colors. They are also similar with their use of slightly distorted figure images and anguished facial expressions. This is particularly true of the first image in Botero's slide. While Botero was inspired by the coverage of the Abu Ghraib prison torture, Goya's inspiration came from his own experience with the Napoleonic Wars (Thanks, Wikipedia.) Either way the two sets of paintings demonstrate the stylistic approach when tackling such a morally reprehensible issue does not have to imitate realism in order to get its point across. The cartoonish approach seems to almost enhance the tragedy of the events they are trying to depict.
The first painting of the series has a dark neutral color palette combined with small bursts of bright, bold colors. Specifically in the attire of the prisoners and, of course, with the blood. The background in comprised entirely of various neutrals in the walls and the floors, the burst of blood spatter on the background of the wall enhances to the dramatic darkness of the location and the prison environment. Interesting how Botero seemed to imitate the traditional image of a prison for his painting when in the real photographs of the prison it looks nothing like a traditional prison. Also the position of the two prisoners are an example of the sexual exploitation of the prisoners forced upon them in order to enhance their humilition, coupled with the fact that they are dressed in women's attire. While none of the original pictures I found (not that I was able to look at them for very long) show that type of humiliation torture strategy exactly it seems a fitting transition for the actual humiliations the prisoners were forced to endure. This, coupled with the brutal demonstration of the one man vomiting blood combines the sexual humiliation and physical violence in one combined image.