'Blood and Iron' by Charles Ernest Butler.
The painting is dated 1916, two years after the events it depicts. Kaiser Wilhelm, on horseback with the Angel of Death at his shoulder, turns aside from leading his troops into further action. The response of the man on the ground is defiant but emasculated and Christ, too, is neutered, limited to the role of offering succour. In the background, the Belgian town of Louvain burns. The work shows no obvious hero to resolve the chaos and destruction. Instead it calls out to the viewer to step forward, to take on the challenge of what looks like an Arthurian quest, and to defeat the foe. In this work Butler depicts the horrors of war, not as a pacifist statement but rather to encourage the recruitment of men to fight the evil of German aggression, personified in the Kaiser. Although this was neither a commissioned painting nor authorised in any respect, it carries a strongly populist message about the war. It is part of a body of work that described German atrocities with an almost pornographic relish, both in attempting to motivate people to resist aggression, and to justify the Allied war effort.
Text: BBC
Text: BBC
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