"Non L'Ami Du Peuple"(2022) Oil on Canvas 45*35

The work is adapted from "La Mort de Marat" of Jacques-Louis David which was dedicated to the assassination of his revolutionary friend Jean-Paul Marat. Accordingly, this painting aims to convey the Marquis de Sade as a revolutionary symbol of anti-civilizational extremism, immorality, and destructive hedonism in the context of David's work. Marquis de Sade was the sinister of the French Revolution with his disgusting acts. His world was madness and violence. He dreamed of a more radical enlightenment, a world full of broken taboos and wild desires. This interesting and scary thinker from whom the word "sadism" is derived must be told. His enthusiasm which has evolved into a vandalism was frightening. The assasination of the famous Jacobin Marat by a female counter-revolutionary Charlotte Corday while typing in his bathtub was extremely shocking for whole society. It was an impressive turning point in both the revolution and the role of women in society, so the seriousness of the situation was certain for everyone.

In France at that time, there could only be one person who would not take this action seriously and use his wine to make it look like blood and pose as if he were dead in his bathtub to make fun of the situation. While the assasination of Marat as a social altruistic figure was a historical loss, Sade was ahistorical, not included in the system, crawls in mental hospitals, stands before us with a nihilistic primitive individualist. Perhaps even Marat's death was something to laugh about for him. The name of the painting comes from Marat's newspaper "L'Ami du peuple", Marat can be a friend of the people, an individual in social fiction or he can even be important. But Sade was not included this fiction. He can be an insignificant devil, he can die or be killed, he can be forgotten or remembered. Maybe we have to ask ourselves if freaking out in such a fictional society could be a privilege to be real...