Martha Rosler: Art That Brought War into the Home
Words by Ella Gauci
If you look at any media outlet that reports on war, you will instantly be bombarded with images of destruction, death, and horror. But we do not look away. We as a society have become desensitized to images of war and human suffering - it is plastered on every news outlet there is.
Martha Rosler wanted to change that. Working during the Vietnam War - often described as the ‘living room war’ because it was shown on TV - she used collage as a form of retaliation against the numbing of society’s reaction against atrocity. Using images printed in Life from the frontlines of the war combined with cut outs from the magazine House Beautiful, her collection ‘House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home’ was born.
Martha Rosler, “Red Stripe Kitchen,” from the series “House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home,” c. 1967-72
The Vietnam War (1955-1975) set itself apart from its precursor wars by the fact that it entered into the domestic spaces of Americans in a novel way - through the media. It was on May 31st in 1967 that Frank Reynolds, an ABC news anchor, first showed viewers video coverage of the Vietnam War. Rosler saw this as both a threat and an opportunity. By displaying the coverage in this manner, there was a chance for the desensitisation of a nation. However, it provided her with the springboard and capacity to explore her collection “House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home” in a way that was both timely and shocking.
Martha Rosler, “Balloons,” from the series “House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home,” c. 1967-72
She began her artistic career as an abstract painter, but swiftly moved onto collage in reaction to the Vietnam War. Her engagement culminated in a series of pieces that combined the idyll of American home life with the atrocities of the war crimes being committed against the Vietnamese civilians. As seen in her piece above entitled ‘Balloons’, the effect was startlingly jarring. It forced Americans to see the reality of a war that they were detached from. To include the horror this was creating for children added fuel to the growing anti-war fire.
Martha Rosler, “First Lady (Pat Nixon),” from the series “House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home,” c. 1967-72
She utilized her art as a form of political retaliation against leadership and their detachment from the brutal reality of war. Her damning piece First Lady (Pat Nixon) contrasts the luxurious life of Pat Nixon with the malnourished mother in the place of the painting behind her. Thinking about recent atrocities and even the coronavirus pandemic, our leaders often can appear oblivious to the reality of ‘real people’.
Martha Rosler’s collection raises a complex debate about what images the public should be privy to see from atrocities. Her collages remind us of the fact that these images of horror are jarring in comparison to our domesticity. There is often a lack of dignity in the images of the dying or mutilated bodies we see. As a society, the sheer number of these images in the media loses the power to shock. An image that forever haunts me is that of the Syrian boy who drowned during the peak of the refugee crisis in 2015. However, from this period there were plenty of images of the dead - this one only retained its power to shock because it was both a child and so alienated from the chaos we were used to seeing.
Martha Rosler, “Patio War ” from the series “House Beautiful: Bringing the War Home,” c. 1967-72
Thus, Rosler used art as a means to shatter the barriers that the media had created between humans. Death and suffering are often innately tied with empathy, and yet the presentation of these images by the media negated any sort of human response from its viewers after they had been subjected to so many images of the horror. Art’s role in this case was to remind people of their humanity, and that the images on their screen were in fact humans, not just pixels.
