Subway Perseus and the Worship of Medusa
How the Public Image Reveals the Soul of the Modern West
Public art and the public image is always political. The Renaissance man understood artwork as a talisman of power that influenced the world around him through the spirits of the people it affected. Today, it is not that the power of artwork has diminished, but that Modern man denies or does not understand the influence it has. But his enemies still understand. And they use the image to their advantage every day in nefarious ways.
An image is powerful when it captures people so much that they cannot look away. This is because it distills an important truth about reality in a simple and undeniable way. In our little modern lives, so many of us spend our time fighting against the lies that are consistently told to us, or submitting to them because it is more convenient. In a world full of lies, the truth sometimes rings with such painful clarity that it compels us to look.
The image on the left is the detainment of Daniel Penny, taken on May 11, 2023, is one such powerful image. The image on the right is a public sculpture of Medusa beheading Perseus that was erected in New York City in 2008. In the modern world, the hero is arrested, and the gorgon holds the head of the hero, her deathly gaze laying bare, without pretension, the true metaphysical evil that controls the Modern West.