Critique #2

Arbeit Macht Frei is the name of the painting, Marcus Jusherwood is the artist. To look at this painting is at first very frightening. The victims in the canter convey fear and look almost dead. Scaling up to their foreheads there lies the Star of David. The Star of David declares that they are Jewish, in some way explaining they’re extreme looks of death and decay. Te background is very dreary, the most significant and noticeable contrast is in the sky, symbolizing a sense of hope.

Besides the two almost zombies there is a man behind them, a walking rotting corpse. To the left of the scene there is a wagon of bodies ready to be hauled to the crematoria. A gate blocking their freedom behind them reads Arbeit Macht Frei translating to work will set you free. This gate is the entrance to Auschwitz death camp, the setting of the painting. Also giving more reason to why the people look so miserable and frightened. From what it looks like the prisoners are entering the gate, because the letters appear backwards.

The dark, almost black colors in this painting make one believe that there was no hope or happiness intended for the people in the death camps. A cluttered background of both decaying and fresh bodies leads one to believe that they don’t just kill and massacre victims once a day, it happens every time the chance came along. The gray skies look smoke filled, smoke and ash coming from the crematoria. This painting says to me that there wasn’t any hope of survival.