Shock Awareness

Mediums: fiberboard, encapsulated wax, oil.
Location: The Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice (Italy).

The symbolic struggle between half a person and half a bird of a hybrid form is expressed in this picture by the compositional decision of the artist – he placed them in the same boat. Brauner depicted figures in the style of schematic Egyptian hieroglyphs, with a sizeable androgynous head combined with a raised bow of the vessel, and the body of the bird merges with the details of its stern. Two Egyptian themes inspired Brauner to create this image – “The Solar Barge” and “Heavenly Refuge”; however, he certainly took the fantastic visual range from his imagination, and not from specific historical sources. So, the strong hands seem to suppress the internal mental conflict, and the third hand stubbornly rows along the river along a predetermined route.