{
object_type: 'Exhibit Item',embed_type: 'image',embed_detail: 'http://myloc.gov/_assets/Exhibitions/herblock/WhiteIsBlack/Assets/19974v_th125.jpg',embed_alt: '“White is Black, Black is White, Night is Day—”',thumbnail: {url: 'http://myloc.gov/_assets/Exhibitions/herblock/WhiteIsBlack/Assets/19974v_th125.jpg',alt: '“White is Black, Black is White, Night is Day—”',height: '66',width: '125'}
}
“White is Black, Black is White, Night is Day—”
Herblock depicts a massive fortress topped with onion domes blaring senseless slogans as a metaphor for the totalitarian authority of the Soviet Union, whose flag flies above the tallest dome. Herblock skillfully unites the visual symbol of state power with the act of broadcasting the cartoon’s title—contradictory phrases that recall the “newspeak,” which is the kind of speech pattern practiced with numbing effect by jailers of the dystopian police state in George Orwell’s landmark 1949 novel 1984. The bastion of power rests ominously upon a global grid.
Herblock depicts a massive fortress topped with onion domes blaring senseless slogans as a metaphor for the totalitarian authority of the Soviet Union, whose flag flies above the tallest dome. Herblock skillfully unites the visual symbol of state power with the act of broadcasting the cartoon’s title—contradictory phrases that recall the “newspeak,” which is the kind of speech pattern practiced with numbing effect by jailers of the dystopian police state in George Orwell’s landmark 1949 novel 1984. The bastion of power rests ominously upon a global grid.