Nicaragua panel of the Overthrow series, oil on wood, 2006
The Overthrow series is among the works currently showing at Kang Contemporary in Berlin (the gallery is located across the street from the Jewish Museum) in the exhibit, transfusio, hiding and revealing, curated by Rahel Schrohe and including works by Katrin von Lehmann, MASCH, Carolyn Prescott, and Raúl de Zárate.
The paintings in the Overthrow series were inspired by and rely heavily on a book by Stephen Kinzer: Overthrow, America’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq. Kinzer is a journalist of extensive experience. He has reported from over 50 countries around the world, served as the New York Times bureau chief in Nicaragua, Germany, and Turkey, and as the Latin America correspondent for the Boston Globe. In this book he documents regime change operations carried out by the U.S. in fourteen sovereign nations over the course of a century, examining only those cases in which “Americans played the decisive role in deposing a regime,” whether by threatened or actual invasion or through covert operations designed to destabilize the existing government. He has drawn from the work of hundreds of journalists and historians and other experts in the field. He gives the context for each regime change, describes the operations that were carried out, and discusses the short-term effects and the long-term repercussions.
I discovered Kinzer’s book soon after it came out in 2006, three years following the invasion of Iraq. Like many who came of age during the Vietnam War era, I have questioned my country’s many interventions, and I wanted to understand the patterns of our involvement in the overthrow of other governments and their leaders.
Responding as an artist to Kinzer’s accounts of regime change, I was struck by the elegiac statements of the deposed, which convey the asymmetry of confronting a nation as powerful as the United States of America. Some of these heads of state submitted their resignations in order to save their people from bloodshed; some stated their cause just before they were forced out or killed; sometimes we have only the words of their compatriots.
In thinking about how to bring these events to light, I thought almost immediately of the tradition of retablo painting developed in Mexico and other parts of Latin America, with origins going back to the European Middle Ages. Variously termed ex votos, votive painting, or retablos, these devo- tional paintings typically tell stories of misfortune followed by a rescue through the miraculous in- tercession of a saint. The artist recreates the story as told by the protagonist. The role of the artist as a faithful listener yet imaginative recorder of stories not widely known seemed to me a fitting one for rendering these stories of regime change. Thus I have appropriated the retablo genre for the Overthrow series, rejecting the notion of a seamless historical narrative in favour of the fragmentary, knowing also that these stories have been and will continue to be told by the people whose governments were overturned.
In formal terms these paintings employ some of the features of retablos—flatness, the absence of traditional perspective, the condensation of pictorial space, and the inclusion of written narrative. They contain components of a linear story of a coup, but like many retablos, they may also jump backward or forward in time, referring to causes and subsequent events. In other ways I have taken liberties with the genre. These paintings do not feature saints; rather, they give voice to the deposed leaders or their representatives. Unlike most retablos, they are not meant to connect to a divinity or supernatural world; rather, they commemorate grief and loss, alluding to the psychic trauma experienced by the leader and the nation, offering images for contemplation, through which, in turn, we can hope to gain insight, to observe patterns of engagement, and consider responsibilities.
Carolyn Prescott, 2021
References
Stephen Kinzer, Overthrow, America’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq. New York: Times Books, Henry Holt and Company, 2006. (Note: Mr. Kinzer does not bear responsibility for any errors of fact or interpretation in the painting series.)
Elin Luque Agraz and Michele Beltrán, “Powerful Images: Mexican Ex-Votos,” Retablos y ex votos. Museo Franz Mayer, Artes de México, 2000
Deutsch Version
Die Inspiration für die Gemälde der Serie Overthrow war das Buch Overthrow, America’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq des amerikanischen Journalisten und Auslandskorrespondenten Stephen Kinzer. Er dokumentiert in diesem Buch Interventionen der Vereinigten Staaten in vierzehn souveränen Ländern, die alle zum Sturz des bestehenden Regimes führten. Ausschließlich geht es ihm dabei um Fälle, in denen „die USA eine entscheidende Rolle bei der Entmachtung spielten“, sei es durch Androhung oder Ausführung einer Militärinvasion oder durch verdeckte Aktionen.
Als ich Kinzers Buch las, beeindruckt mich besonders die elegische Sprache der entmachteten Politiker. Aus ihr klingt die Asymmetrie der Konfrontation mit einer Supermacht wie den Vereinigten Staaten. Einige der aufgeführten Staatsoberhäupter traten von ihrem Amt zurück, um den Menschen ihres Landes das Blutvergießen zu ersparen. In einigen Fällen haben wir dazu nur die Aussagen ihrer Landsleute.
Bei den Überlegungen, wie ich diese Ereignisse bildnerisch ans Licht bringen könnte, fiel mir gleich die bildnerische Tradition lateinamerikanischer Retablos ein, wie man sie zum Beispiel in Mexiko findet. Solche Gemälde erzählen typischerweise die Geschichte eines Unglücks, auf das – vermittelt durch einen Heiligen – die Rettung folgt. Der Künstler malt, wovon die Hauptperson erzählt. Die Rolle des Künstlers als genauer Zuhörer und gleichzeitig als Aufzeichner von wenig bekannten Geschichten erschien mir für die Wiedergabe dieser Geschichten von Regimewechseln passend. Meine Bilder zeigen keine Heiligen, sondern lassen die abgesetzten Führer oder ihre Vertreter selbst sprechen. Im Gegensatz zu den meisten Retablos sollen sie keine Verbindung zu einer Gottheit herstellen; vielmehr erinnern sie an Trauer und Verlust, indem sie auf das psychische Trauma des jeweiligen Oberhauptes und Landes anspielen und als Bilder Kontemplation anbieten, durch die wir wiederum hoffen können, Einsicht zu gewinnen, Muster der Verstrickung zu beobachten und Verantwortlichkeiten in Betracht zu ziehen.
Übersetzung: Ralf Jaeger