Bolívar on Rousseau’s Horse
Gallery 5. Powers
Photo credits: Colección de arte SURA
Click on the image to enlarge
Dora Ramírez
1988
Screen printing on fabric
118 x 157cm
A nude Bolívar rides a black horse with reddish mane and tail among leafless trees. The work depicts the leader of the independence armies of New Granada wielding a spear topped with a heart and waving a yellow, blue, and red flag. It references the horse from Henry Rousseau’s oil painting The War and alludes to the philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau, author of the theory of the “Social Contract.” Ramírez brings together the thinker, the artist, and the soldier, symbolising different facets of power. The artist offers a metaphor for the three branches of public power: executive, legislative, and judicial, established in Article 113 of the Political Constitution.
