An Analogy of War

Max Ernst, French, Born Germany, 1891- 1976.

Spanish Physician, 1940, Oil on Canvas.

Photographed by Judith Huang at the Art Institute of Chicago, IL.

My interpretation:

The Horse of War, a sheet masking his true nature, looks curiously –

A woman, her face stricken with fear, her clothes half torn with starvation, runs off the frame, desperately tossing a token of peace – a blind bird –

The squat man stands, oblivious, on the left. On the hip of his horse is the face of death – the face of war and death.