A Visual Analysis of a World War II Poster Essay

Keep this Horror from Your understructure, an American propaganda government note produced during World War II, uses some(prenominal) visual and textual matterual elements to encourage Americans to buy war bonds by depiction the Japanese as rapists. The author of the piece is unkn give, but it is obvious that the origin of the poster c atomic number 18fully chooses the color in, patterns, scale, text, and representation of the piece to send a rattling strong social and political message. There is little doubt that the underlie message was directed towards all Americans during World War II, and not towards a single community or group of people. The viewer does not urgency an art background or even the slightest political aw atomic number 18ness to envision the implication of the poster.Rather, the poster is simple and straightforward. The central focalise of the poster is on the Japanese man, whose facial features are clearly exaggerated to instill f chasten and disgust in the eyes of the viewer. In railway line, the frightened and vulnerable materialization of the American woman, who is helpless in the grasp of the Japanese soldier, fuels the viewers hatred for the Japanese even more. Its message is palpable to the extent of the quickest glance, yet there is more evidence hidden beyond the find of the poster. Its full visual potential can be realized entirely after analyzing the various visual and textual elements in exacting detail. by and by examining and exploring the poster in depth, it becomes apparent that the color scheme plays an important exercise in grant the role of the victim and of the enemy. The Japanese soldier has really dark trim whereas the American young lady being threatened and mayhap raped has fair skin. The dark versus light contrast always seems to play the struggle between evil and good. The technique in which the creator of the poster uses in juxtaposing the dark skin of the Japanese soldier with the light skin of the American girl fully achieves his intended purpose. Further inspection reveals other dark versus light contrast. The Japanese soldier wears a black troops issued hat while the American soldier on the lower right corner of the poster wears a white cap, subconsciously suggesting that the Japanese phalanx is evil and that the American forces are good.The blood red color of the background, the silken red lips of the Japanese soldier, and the reddish hue on the American girls cheeks all seem to allude to the sexuality of the poster. The use of the color red symbolizes blood, violence, and rape.Besides the red background and the dark versus light contrast of the Japanese soldier and the American girls skin colors, the placards that memorialize Invest 10% in War Bonds and Back up Our Battleskies are the only other colors represented on the entire poster. It is provoke to note that the color of the two placards matches the color of the American girls skin. The entire poster is dominated, if not limited, to these three colors red, dark, and light. This allows the viewer to focus on and to look beyond the color scheme and recognize its symbolical meaning, rather than just to admire the colors of the poster without delving beneath the cake meaning.Scale and pattern also play an important role in defining our perception of each character in the poster. For example, the Japanese soldiers hands are so large that they appear to twine the American girls face, causing the viewer to feel threatened. In addition, the Japanese soldiers teeth are jagged and massive, straight off chuffing attention to his beast- standardised, merciless expression. One may even draw the conclusion that the Japanese soldier represents some kind of wild animal, as his posture and expression seem too cruel to be human. His affright and imposing figure in conjunction with the phrase, Keep This HORROR from Your Home gives the reader the feeling that both his own country and home are be ing threatened by the Japanese. At this point, the text and the font coat and style of the text become very important to the overall meaning of the poster and make it a very effective propaganda poster.In assigning the word HORROR a larger font size than the spoken language around it, the artist wants the viewer to focus on the word Horror, which instills a signified of fear and insecurity into the viewer. Italicizing the word Your gives the viewer a sense of identity with his country and inspires a sense of pride and obligation in defending his own home, his own nation. Thats where the genius of the poster comes in. hobby the feeling of anxiety and urgency that the poster pushes onto the viewer, a simple etymon is offered Invest 10% in War Bonds. The artist obviously intentional the poster to stimulate the sales of war bonds, and he succeeds in doing so because he presents such a morbid and exaggerated scene, climaxing with the threatening phrase Keep This HORROR from Your Ho me. In a literal sense, the phrase, Invest 10% in War Bonds, is analogous to the denouement of the posters plot. afterward analyzing the poster in full detail, one understands all the aspects of the poster. Questions as to wherefore the artist used certain color schemes, why he presented the characters like he did, and why he used such powerful text are answered. Like most typical World War II propaganda posters, this poster, capitalizes on the nationalistic pride of the people in defending their own nation. In doing so, it exploits the stereotypical view of the Japanese soldier and paints a becloud of sin to rouse the spirits of Americans. Racial inferiority, hate crimes, and discrimination are the end results of such propaganda posters. Does the artist carry out his intended object of selling war bonds and stirring up emotions of anger and fear in Americans? Without a doubt But whether such use of propaganda is ethical and justify is an entirely separate question.