Social and Political Criticism of Ben Shahn

Most recently the 'Arts Discussion Group' focused on the work of Ben Shahn. A major social and political critic throughout his career, during the 1920's and 30's he became heavily involved in portraying the events of the Sacco-Vanzetti court case, which attracted world wide media attention, and still remains one of the most famous trials in modern American legal history. It is difficult to summarize but basically two Italian immigrants were charged with armed robbery and murder, and then executed;

'Sacco and Vanzetti were executed on August 23, 1927, a date that became a watershed in twentieth-century American history. It became the last of a long train of events that had driven any sense of utopian vision out of American life. The workings of American democracy now seemed to many Americans as flawed and unjust as many of the older societies of the world, no longer embodying any bright ideal, but once again serving the interests of the rich and the powerful. American intellectuals were powerfully moved by the case.' - Robert D'Attilio

In his epochal masterpiece, USA, John Dos Passos raged in one "Camera Eye" episode;

"All right you have won... America our nation has been beaten by strangers who have turned our language inside out... they have built the electric chair and hired the executioner to throw the switch... all right we are two nations..."

Heavy stuff, but looking at major social, historical and political events through the eyes of an artist is certainly enlightening. We all wondered why Ben Shahn would choose to concentrate his energies on such an event? Part of the answer is in the fact that he himself was a Jewish immigrant from Lithuania. Also, the arrest of Sacco and Vanzetti had coincided with the period of the most intense political repression in American history, the "Red Scare" of 1919-20. Edmund Wilson observed that the case... "revealed the whole anatomy of American life with all its classes, professions, and points of view and all their relations, and it raised almost every fundamental question of our political and social system."

So, in the end we are left with some remarkable insights into American society and the concept of justice. We are left with a big question: Are we all equal under the law or are there degrees of leniency for some and accents of discrimination for others? Could ethnic background, accent or language, political persuasion, even skin color contribute to a condemnation under the law?

The Copyright to Contradictions, Gross Factual Errors and Plain Plagiarism Reserved: David John Drew, 2013.