Colonialism & empire
Featured Artworks
The Execution of Emperor Maximilian
Édouard Manet (1867–1868)
Manet’s The Execution of Emperor Maximilian confronts state violence with a <strong>cool, reportorial</strong> style. The wall of gray-uniformed riflemen, the <strong>fragmented canvas</strong>, and the dispassionate loader at right turn the killing into <strong>impersonal machinery</strong> that implicates the viewer <sup>[1]</sup><sup>[2]</sup>.
Les Demoiselles d'Avignon
Pablo Picasso (1907)
Les Demoiselles d'Avignon hurls five nudes toward the viewer in a shallow, splintered chamber, turning classical beauty into <strong>sharp planes</strong>, <strong>masklike faces</strong>, and <strong>fractured space</strong>. The fruit at the bottom reads as a sensual lure edged with threat, while the women’s direct gazes indict the beholder as participant. This is the shock point of <strong>proto‑Cubism</strong>, where Picasso reengineers how modern painting means and how looking works <sup>[1]</sup><sup>[2]</sup>.