"Rider (Happy Horseshit)" 2011
Velveeta Heartbreak
Brooklyn, USA
64" (162.5cm) x 48" (123cm), pencil on paper
Sold
"The Rider" ("Reuter" in German), is a Northern Renaissance engraving by Albrecht Durer, created in 1513. So-called “The Knight, Death, and the Devil” by art historians, the artwork was titled simply “Reuter” by Dürer himself. Dürer's "Rider" depicts a knight upon his trusted horse, venturing into the wild forest, the safety of his castle far away on the hill, fearlessly facing death and the devil, driven onward by his faith in God's unwavering path.
Or so it has been interpreted over time.
It was supposedly one of Adolf Hitler’s favorite prints, as Hitler insisted that this print embodied the nationalistic pride of the Aryan race and represented the Teutonic superiority of the Germans. This sentimental reading of Dürer’s work has been cast aside, and the true nature of Dürer’s masterpiece seems to be a sort of inside-joke, or sixteenth century political cartoon, critiquing the Emperor Maximillian’s participation in “The Battle of the Spurs”, a sort of visual retribution sought by Dürer against the emperor. There are various visual clues and symbols that, in the sixteenth century, would be obvious, but are lost to contemporary viewers. Either way, it is a masterpiece of technique, and a triumph of symbolist imagery, since it can appeal at so many levels and interpretations, over so many centuries.
Fast-forward 500 years. Our knight is but a ghostly wisp of his former self, and his trusty steed is no better for the treatment he's received as mankind's 'beast of burden'. On his back sits a drunken monkey grabbing a free ride. On our knight's spear rests the skull of a former companion. Hovering overhead, the ghost of a jezebel he cannot save, infinitely falling to her death. Our knight now sports state-of-the-art "x-ray laser vision", despite his being completely blind in both eyes and unable to see either past or future. His horse plods through the empty praise shat out by those who trod before him, as he shits out a pile of his own. His tail grows into a beautiful rose bush, deceiving all those who follow. The horse is toothless as well, his rotting dentures flung towards the viewer's face. “From the horse’s mouth” are pumped out the very clouds of darkness “the knight” has sworn to defeat, and thus the darkness becomes “the night”. This futile procession is led by some type of grotesque primate, the knight's offspring perhaps, dancing and laughing as he tugs the reins with whim and caprice. Following behind and beneath is a strange beast that is half elephant, half donkey. Finally, we see that our rider is trapped in his own hamster-wheel of time, forever stuck in the mud, unable to escape his own bullshit.
Back to Gallerymjb Homepage/Main Menu
© Michael J Bowman - All Rights Reserved
