Mother
母
Oil, iron, and bronze on canvas
Diptych (front/reverse), 160 x 80cm (each) x 2, 2026
For Erich Neumann
Front
After ‘Erster Wunsch’ (First Wish), by Ivan Meštrović, and the bronze inscription ‘母’ (mother) from the Jihu Mu Fangding (Early Western Zhou, c. 1046–950 BCE)
Oil on canvas, 160 x 80cm
Reverse
Oil, iron, and bronze on canvas, 160 x 80cm
Jan. 26, 2026
What is the opposite of love?
Not hate.
Power.
Compare these two famous Pietà: Käthe Kollwitz (Neue Wache, Berlin) and Michelangelo (St Peter’s, Vatican).
Look carefully at the son.
How much space does he have?
How much independence does his body retain in relation to the mother?
In Michelangelo’s Pietà, Christ remains a body of his own. Even in death he retains weight and dignity. Mary supports him, but she does not collapse upon him. The gesture is restrained and open—a quiet acceptance. Even in mourning, the mother allows the son to remain separate from her.
In Kollwitz’s sculpture, the relation is different. The mother encloses the child. Her body dominates the composition; the son appears helpless, frail, effete, almost absorbed into her mass. The embrace becomes a kind of enclosure.
The version installed at Neue Wache is already a later transformation of this motif. Kollwitz described it as representing ‘no longer pain but reflection… an old, lonely, and brooding woman.’
But look at the earlier version: Mother with Dead Child, 1903, Etching.
So primal. So real.
The arms close in desperation. Fear tightens the embrace. Protection turns into possession.
Here the two sides of the Great Mother archetype appear clearly.
The nurturing mother gives life by allowing separation.
The devouring mother holds so tightly that the child cannot leave.
Where love cannot release, power takes its place.
And the embrace becomes a trap.
Mar. 24, 2026
Day 25 of the U.S.-Israeli war on Iran. Gold, which stood at $5,386 on the first day, at one point fell below $4,200.
K called about gold and sent me a post by Ray Dalio on X:
It all comes down to who controls the Strait of Hormuz: the ‘final battle.’
Dalio says: if the U.S. can regain control of the Strait of Hormuz, the world may recover confidence in dollar hegemony. If not, gold will rise.
Question: Take profits now, or double down?
Answer: Quite apart from Iran’s strategic advantages, for more than two years the world has watched Israel, with U.S. support, carry out genocide in Gaza and done nothing. And now, once again, the U.S. and Israel have lured Iran into negotiations only to attack it. On the first day, Israel killed an Ayatollah—the ‘Shiite pope’—and the U.S. bombed a primary school, killing 168 little girls. Iran has won people’s hearts. I’m betting on that. 人心.
The U.S. military, the dollar, and American propaganda are bound together, each sustaining the others. If one fails, the whole power structure begins to collapse.
And when American propaganda finally loses its grip, can the ‘history of contemporary art’ be rewritten?
Between 1971 and 2021, U.S. and EU economic sanctions killed about 38 million people worldwide. All in the name of ‘liberal democracy.’
How inspiring does ‘liberal democracy’ sound today, compared to 30 years ago?
Everything is forever—until it is no more.