A mosaic of soldiers who have died in Iraq:

April 24, 2004 3:44 PM

A mosaic of soldiers who have died in Iraq:Below is a small version of an image I made. It's a mosaic composed of the photos of the American service men and women who have died in Iraq. No photograph is used more than three times. Here is a medium-sized version, 800 x 925 pixels. Here is the full-sized version, 1890 x 2209 pixels. I call the image 'War President':
posted by Postroad (12 comments total)

Just for reference, the whole "I made" thing is a quote, right? i.e. this is not actually a self-link?

I've seen something like this a few days ago. I think it's a powerful concept. In some cases even more striking than the photos of the coffins. I'm sure I'll get flamed for the comparison, but it reminds me of that painting from the Sensation exhibit which mosaiced a photo of a famous British serial killer out of hundreds of infants' handprints.
posted by XQUZYPHYR at 4:04 PM on April 24, 2004

memo to posty: it's a 3 weeks old thing, it's been mentioned already in at least one MeFi thread, it has already stirred a lot of shit.
posted by matteo at 4:11 PM on April 24, 2004

Postroad, good link, but please don't copy and paste text from the target site as your post. Stylistically it looks horrible and it smacks of laziness. Add your own text: Why are you posting the link here, and how does it further Mefi's guidelines of eliciting discussion from others?
posted by PrinceValium at 4:19 PM on April 24, 2004

yes, teacher.
posted by quonsar at 4:21 PM on April 24, 2004

i've seen the same idea, except the mosaic was made with pictures of assholes. even more powerful and less divisive.
posted by whoshotwho at 4:27 PM on April 24, 2004

it's a very powerful image, and it should be seen widely. It's interesting, and it's on the web. What more do you need?

But this is who actually made it
posted by amberglow at 4:31 PM on April 24, 2004

if you scroll up from my link in that site, you'll see updates and more commentary and reaction.
posted by amberglow at 4:36 PM on April 24, 2004

Using the photographs of dead people to prove your own political point?

Pretty tasteless. Even though I dislike the war, etc.
posted by xmutex at 5:17 PM on April 24, 2004

Misleading the public into a war?

Far more tasteless.
posted by iamck at 5:20 PM on April 24, 2004

Isn't this style of art officially tacky yet? I'm going to place a yard gnome out in the garden for each Iraqi child killed.
posted by dgaicun at 5:35 PM on April 24, 2004

Marcus Harvey did something similar.
posted by seanyboy at 5:45 PM on April 24, 2004

This is reminiscent of Chuck Close's work :

" For 30 years, Chuck Close has created portraits rendered in a grid format. Robert, a portrait of artist Robert Rauschenberg, celebrates the grid as an artist's tool and as an abstract structure that is beautiful in its own right. Close's use of the grid replicates one of the oldest methods of making paintings and drawings. Artists such as Leonardo and Durër used a perspectival lattice to break down space into small units that were easily mapped onto the surface of the canvas. Together the individual units coalesced into an integrated image. Close, however, refuses to let his grid recede from sight. Each cell of his grid is an individual abstract painting composed of brightly colored concentric circles and squares. Close works from photographs that have been superimposed with a grid, but then abstracts the image by painting four units on the canvas for every one on the source photograph."

I'm not sure yet how I feel about the Bush face. I have mixed feelings. I think it's powerful - I suppose - though some might call the effect a gimmick. But is it appropriate? Or respectful to the dead?

I wonder.
posted by troutfishing at 5:45 PM on April 24, 2004