Critique of Martha Rosler's Saddam's Palace

Saddam's Palace by Martha Rosler

            This is a masterfully put together photo montage of a middle-aged woman cleaning her couches and a soldier wandering in a destroyed building. The exposure is perfect and the motion is very fun to observe.  Martha Rosler’s technique at capturing individual detail in the background as well as the foreground is admirable, because it’s hard to tell whether the subject should look at the battleground or the woman cleaning.  This unusual combination of wartime chaos and domestic tranquility are completely incompatible with each other. For example, the soldier and woman are so engrossed in their own world they don’t notice the other world exists.  And the aesthetic surroundings of the sitting room completely clash with the ugly war-torn scene. This photograph is too politically minded for me to consider it a masterpiece, but this photo is still very eye-clashing.

This photograph’s mood is quite tranquil at first glance, but, at second glance, are two completely different moods “smashed” together. For example, the mood in the battlefield is a devastating, and eerily calm, like the eye in a hurricane. And the mood in the foreground is very happy and content. Rosler’s intention to bring war home to America has certainly been achieved. This paragraph perfectly is described by the following quote “. . . Rosler has become increasingly brazen in illustrating America’s connection to the terrors of war.  Saddam’s Palace states that, as the United States so ‘delicately’ attempts, simply glossing over a mess with a slight and temporary fix doesn’t fool anyone. . .”  (Burnaway).  This photograph is very unsettling and makes me very uncomfortable.  The fact that the woman is moving while the soldier is standing completely still is very . . .disturbing almost.

http://www.burnaway.org/2008/10/martha-rosler-bringing-the-war-home-at-emory-visual-arts-gallery/