Paul Klee, Angelus Novus, 1920What is the facial expression of the above figure? Is it fear or focused concentration? Is the figure's body language that of horror and stepping back or rather of getting ready to step forward?
The prevailing way of reading the image comes from the following text: "There is a picture by Paul Klee called Angelus Novus. In it, an angel is depicted who appears, as if trying to distance himself from something that he stares at. His eyes and mouth gape wide, his wings are stressed to their limit. The Angel of History must look this way; he has turned to face the past. Where we see a constant chain of events, he sees only a single catastrophe incessantly piling ruin upon ruin and hurling them at his feet." - Walter Benjamin, “On the concept of history”, 1940
Benjamin had more than enough reasons to see the world in such terms. Nothing was making sense around him, the horror was closing on Europe and on him personally. (Shortly after writing these words he committed suicide on the French-Spanish border, while trying to escape to America.)
Seventy years later, some still see this image through the Benjamin’s glasses to illustrate the unpredictability and cruelty of History to us. Recently in “The Art of Life” by Zygmunt Bauman, (2008) I have found a more balanced approach: (My translation from a Polish edition) “People of that epoch, like the Angel of History, from the Paul Klee’s painting, with its memorable commentary by Walter Benjamin, stared in horror at the past and present cruelties. Terrified by what they saw - the sea of blood and human suffering - they were escaping into the past. The force of rejection was stronger to them than the force of attraction. It was not a vision of a happiness that pulled them toward the future, it was rather a sight of pain and misfortune that pushed them away from the past.” (This quote appears in the context of commenting on the ideas of Jean-Claude Michea)
Encouraged by Bauman's clear distinction between the past and the now, I wonder how can we honor and respect the cry of the victims without giving power to their persecutors. Don’t we need to constantly dust off our metaphors? How can we remember, yet not allow the horror of the past to rule over our present? I also wonder about the "angelic" aspect of the figure Paul Klee drew. Was it an angel or a demon? What should it be to us?
