The Bloody Chameleon and Impossible Justice Print

Pieter Bruegel the Elder, in one of his last paintings, done in 1568, "The Magpie on the Gallows", makes clear his assessment of the religious persecution and the skewed, impossible justice that results from the union of church and state. He cleverly makes use of the unnaturally twisted gallows as a metaphor to illustrate the perverted justice or an impossible justice by turning the gallows into an "impossible object" such as the "penrose triangle" or the "impossible trident". Also, the two vertical standards of the supporting structure of the gallows can be viewed as one being the church and the other support as the state, on which rests the horizontal beam, where injustice is carried out in murdering the innocent who chose to worship God according to their conscience. In my work, the bloody chameleon represents the violent history of the church; the pale grey American flag, with the union down, is a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger and is visually subordinate to the yellow and white colors of the Vatican flag.

Print:Giclee on Fine Art Paper

Size:10 W x 8 H x 0.1 D in

Size with Frame:15.25 W x 13.25 H x 1.2 D in

Delivery Time:Typically 5-7 business days for domestic shipments, 10-14 business days for international shipments.