Cambodian GenocideHolden SenaEnglish 9-1due date

Cambodian GenocideHolden SenaEnglish 9-1due date

Background • Took place in Cambodia• Khmer Rouge took over the government • Wanted to make Cambodia an agrarian society• 1975-1978• Khmer made the people work till death and killed mass amounts of people• Khmer lead by Pol Pot• Targeted anybody in urban areas, left rural people mostly alone

Selected Art • Artist: Vann Nath• Title: Artist in His Cell• Survivor of the Khmer Rouge prison S-21• Lived because he was a talented artist

Artist is His Cell • Painted in 1980 a year after the Khmer Rouge ended• Made in Cambodia • Created to show the torture he endured at S-21, the secret prison the

Khmer • Helped raise awareness to how truly horrific it was• Shows a portrait of him in his cell during his torture • Nath has painted numerous more paintings showcasing terrible events

committed by the Khmer Rouge

Visual Imagery in Artist is His Cell

• The extremely thin arms, legs, and ribs • The visual imagery shows the awful conditions he had to suffer in

Imagery in Night• “From the depths of the mirror, a corpse was contemplating me” (Wiesel

115). • Visual imagery shows how tortured and beat-up he was in the terrible

conditions

Imagery Comparison • Both symbolize torture and terrible conditions• Both show people who were in awful health and barely alive• Both help to realize the depressed and awful tone

Motif In Artist is His Cell• Hunger• Displayed by his poor health and tiny cell

Motif In Night• Hunger• “I was nothing but a body. Perhaps even less: a famished stomach. The

stomach alone was measuring time” (Wiesel 52).

Motif Comparison • Both show the hunger the survivors had• Both were in a prison • Both create a tone of desperation• Hunger is a common motif in all genocides and used a tool for controlling

people

Works Cited

Nath, Vann. Artist in His Cell. 1980. Oil on canvas. Private collection.

Wiesel, Elie Wiesel. Night. N.p.: Hill and Wang, 2006. Print.

Background • Took place in Cambodia• Khmer Rouge took over the government • Wanted to make Cambodia an agrarian society• 1975-1978• Khmer made the people work till death and killed mass amounts of people• Khmer lead by Pol Pot• Targeted anybody in urban areas, left rural people mostly alone

Selected Art • Artist: Vann Nath• Title: Artist in His Cell• Survivor of the Khmer Rouge prison S-21• Lived because he was a talented artist

Artist is His Cell • Painted in 1980 a year after the Khmer Rouge ended• Made in Cambodia • Created to show the torture he endured at S-21, the secret prison the

Khmer • Helped raise awareness to how truly horrific it was• Shows a portrait of him in his cell during his torture • Nath has painted numerous more paintings showcasing terrible events

committed by the Khmer Rouge

Visual Imagery in Artist is His Cell

• The extremely thin arms, legs, and ribs • The visual imagery shows the awful conditions he had to suffer in

Imagery in Night• “From the depths of the mirror, a corpse was contemplating me” (Wiesel

115). • Visual imagery shows how tortured and beat-up he was in the terrible

conditions

Imagery Comparison • Both symbolize torture and terrible conditions• Both show people who were in awful health and barely alive• Both help to realize the depressed and awful tone

Motif In Artist is His Cell• Hunger• Displayed by his poor health and tiny cell

Motif In Night• Hunger• “I was nothing but a body. Perhaps even less: a famished stomach. The

stomach alone was measuring time” (Wiesel 52).

Motif Comparison • Both show the hunger the survivors had• Both were in a prison • Both create a tone of desperation• Hunger is a common motif in all genocides and used a tool for controlling

people

Works Cited

Nath, Vann. Artist in His Cell. 1980. Oil on canvas. Private collection.

Wiesel, Elie Wiesel. Night. N.p.: Hill and Wang, 2006. Print.