Judgments

Veterans pose as the different characters in Michelangelo’s masterpiece, The Last Judgment. Dressed in their uniforms, they enact the many roles of savior, saints, martyrs, demons and damned. My Christ figure is a Chicana in full-battle gear. Instead of clouds, lyrics from various songs connect the groups of figures and function like thought bubbles. “Thought you were going up the field a ways and join all the other living souls but you never came,” laments a marine, flying above the crowds, an American flag unfurling behind him. Below, another replies cynically, “Yes, I’ve seen it before, just little bits of history repeating.”

Other versions of The Last Judgment follow, each exploring a line of questioning suggested by Michelangelo’s expression.