The Massacre of Chios, Eugene Delacroix, 1824

Description of the picture:

The Massacre of Chios – Eugene Delacroix. 1824. Oil on canvas. 417×354

   Painting from time to time becomes sharp, striking hard, unsafe and revealing. No one was left with phlegmatic actions on the Greek peninsula that survived the bloody massacre organized by the Turkish enslavers. In this story there was everything – treachery, bloodthirstiness, dishonor, betrayal … In punishment for freedom and zeal to throw off the foreign yoke, the inhabitants were punished. By order of the ruler of the Ottoman Empire, children, ladies, guys were killed. Of the one hundred thousandth population, at least 2 thousand survived, who were converted to Islam against their will.

   To convey the whole nightmare of the massacre, the painter uses an unusual technique. There are no strong feelings in his work, there is no suffering on the faces of the victims, the faces of the killers are also exponentially measured. But this is precisely what causes the strongest response in the soul of the viewer.

   The unfortunate victims of the traitorous attack did not resist, they submitted to their own fate and awaited an imminent end. In them there is not even the horror of perdition, only expectation …

   The Turkish rider on a rearing stallion also does not feel any emotions towards its victims. He makes an order and is calm, confident in the justice of what is happening.

   The faceless nature, creating the background for the foreground, also does not underline the dramatic nature of the plot. She phlegmically sees, is not able to change the course of the disaster."