Peace and War 1820

Curator: Vernet's "Peace and War," an oil painting from 1820, it’s a poignant scene. There’s such an air of desolation, emphasized by the lone figure against that ruined wall. How do you interpret this work in terms of the figure's social position? Editor: It's powerful, certainly bleak. The defeated soldier almost seems like a peasant by his dress, leaning against the ruins with a weary expression. Is Vernet trying to convey the perspective of those affected by constant warring, regardless of any supposed glory? Curator: Exactly! It powerfully inverts heroic narratives by focusing on the discarded. Romanticism often touched upon nationalism. But it seems that Vernet understood war from a position of those who experienced war on their land, like colonial subjects. Where do you see signs of class and colonial consciousness in this painting? Editor: I see it in his clothing, the destroyed farmland. He looks like a man whose life is dedicated to working the land, with only ruin after conflict. And his gear! The damaged plough lies unused in front of him... The suggestion of a once-fertile, hopeful, rural setting, now marred. Curator: Precisely, he stands near the ruin of war but also ruin as policy, ruin as colonial occupation. It challenges the celebratory militarism pervasive at the time. Does that reading shift your perception of the painting at all? Editor: It does. Before, I saw it simply as an anti-war statement, focused on the individual. Now, the narrative of class and colonialism creates another whole layer of complexity. Thanks! Curator: The intersectional reading definitely enriches it, I think. It becomes not just about war’s tragedy, but about the systems that perpetuate it.