"The children of today will make the India of tomorrow” - Jawaharlal Nehru. A nation that understands the value of childhood also ensures its future. Throughout history, artists have depicted childhood to explore varied themes. The image of a child in art has conveyed far stronger messages than those with a hundred painted adults.
The Fearless Girl
This little girl, standing tall and confident, is one of the most powerful symbols of women empowerment. Located in New York City before the Stock Exchange, this 4-feet-high girl, sculpted in bronze, carries a plaque that states, ‘Know the power of women in leadership. SHE makes a difference.‘
When the statue was first installed at Wall Street in 2017, it took the city by storm. ‘Fearless Girl’ by Kristen Visbal, with her hands on her hips and her chin up, was placed facing the iconic ‘Charging Bull’, a day before International Women’s Day, to send out the message of gender diversity in the workplace and to persuade companies to recruit women not only as employees but also to their boards. The sculpture was meant to be displayed only for a week, but as her popularity grew rapidly, she continued to remain for the whole year, until someone raised an outcry loud enough to warrant relocation.
The ‘Charging Bull’ sculptor Arturo Di Modica complained to the city officials that the placement of the ‘Fearless Girl’ created an impression that she was an opposing force to the Bull and completely changed the context. He found it insulting and his protests eventually led to her being shifted to the current location. A plaque with footprints was left behind where she once stood, to facilitate photo seekers. One of the most influential images today, that embodies the resilience of women through the simple posture of a child, was carefully planned by her creator Visbal who had this to say: “I made sure to keep her features soft. She’s not defiant, she’s brave, proud and strong, not belligerent.“
The Problem We All Live With
‘The Problem We All Live With’, a painting from 1964 by American artist Norman Rockwell, simply depicts a little girl going to school. What could be profound about that? Why is the painting considered iconic? The 1960’s wasn’t just another period and the child wasn’t just another girl going to school. She was six-year-old Ruby Bridges, the first African- American child to attend an all-white public school in 1960, during the school desegregation crisis. Although her father was initially reluctant, her mother was determined to send her to school even with all the violent threats against her, so that it would be a step forward for all African-American children. US Marshalls escorted her for days and according to a former Federal Marshall, “She showed a lot of courage. She never cried. She didn’t whimper. She just marched along like a little soldier, and we’re all very very proud of her.” And this, despite all the shouting and jeering from the crowds.
Rockwell immortalised this moment in his painting, framed to show the heads of the police officers cropped at the shoulders, while focusing only on the brave little girl. On the wall behind her, slurs and a splattered tomato are visible. The artist was also not spared with many accusing him of being a “race traitor”. When the former US President Barack Obama installed this defining image of the Civil Rights Movement, in the White House in 2011, he told Ruby Bridges, “I think it’s fair to say that if it hadn’t been for you guys, I might not be here and we wouldn’t be looking at this together.”
The Girl With The Balloon
Here is how the graffiti of a child reaching out for a red, heart-shaped balloon by street artist Banksy, rose to become an art history icon. It appeared as a series of stencil murals around London from 2002, with the accompanying message - ‘There is always hope’. The balloon was not a mere toy. It was a metaphor for innocence and dreams, and the prayer of hope. The image became so sought-after that pop stars sported tattoos of it and the Eiffel Tower displayed it as a projected image. In 2018, a framed copy was auctioned at Sotheby’s and just after the bidding closed, it spontaneously shredded, to everyone’s shock. Banksy admitted that he had planted a mechanical device in the frame and even gave it a new name: ‘Love Is In The Bin’!
The Crying Boy
This baby boy created quite a scare in the 1980s when mass-produced prints of him, by Italian artist Giovanni Bragolin, were labelled as bearing a dreadful curse. It was found that when houses with a copy of the painting burned down, the painting remained intact. Once the tabloids started reporting this as claims by a firefighter, the belief in the curse spread. Stories of the boy having died in a fire and his spirit being trapped in the painting soon circulated. The case was investigated and it was discovered that the prints were treated with varnish that was fire retardant and when the string that held the painting burned, it resulted in the painting falling face down and thus, remained unaffected.
The Unforgettable Face of Tragedy
Not all images of children symbolise hope and strength. Some of them will always remain as lessons in history. This haunting photograph from the Bhopal Gas Tragedy and its aftermath, will forever shake the collective conscience of the country for generations. The chemical leak that killed almost 22,000 people is a dark blot on humanity and this image serves as a reminder of what human greed and indifference can do to the world.
(By Jitha Karthikeyan of The New Indian Express)