Demagogue
Noun
- A political leader who seeks support by appealing to the desires and prejudices of ordinary people rather than by using rational argument.
Demagogue is a steel sculpture in gold of a man in a suit and overcoat with a sousaphone. The figure stands an imposing 91 inches in height with the bell of a sousaphone serving as the figure’s head. The sculpture simultaneously resembles a politician and a parade musician; yet metal in place of human visage gives the piece a machine like quality. As politician and musician devoid of humanity, the piece has the pied piper quality essential to a demagogue.
Artists such as Francisco Goya depicted faceless machine-like destructive power in his painting
The Third of May. Goya depicted faceless soldiers as all cloak and rifle. In Picasso’s
Guernica, Fascist power becomes a bull turning his head away from humanity. In Demagogue, the bell of the single largest instrument in a marching band mimics the sound and shape of a loudspeaker used in political rallies for over a century. The figure’s right arm dissolves into the sousaphone reminding the viewer of Marshal McLuhan’s statement, “The medium is the message.” In a contemporary culture where content and character are defined by wealth and media savvy, gold and bombast have the potential to become a parade of boots on the ground.
