Tory MP Jacob Rees-Mogg as John Edward Millais' Ophelia. Image courtesy of @gazweetman.
This past week has possibly been the biggest yet in the Brexit debacle. From MPs voting to stop a No-Deal Brexit (a scenario in which the UK stumbles out of the EU with no pre-negotiated terms or agreements), to the proposition of another general election, the last seven days have felt less ‘House of Commons’ and more ‘House of Cards’. And so, as we attempt to soothe the nagging feeling that Britain has irrevocably descended into chaos, we’ve called on the help of a few familiar oil-paintings dredged up from the dusty annals of Western art history to shed some light on the madness.
“Tory-Rebel MPs”
'Consequences of War', Titian. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
The words ‘Tory’ and ‘rebel’ are not exactly synonymous, and yet as 21 Tory-Rebel MPs voted against Prime Minister Boris Johnson and for a bill to block a No-Deal brexit, this marriage of linguistics has never felt more appropriate. ‘21 Tory-Rebel MPs’ sounds like an underground ‘70s punk band, or a much improved, more political, Twenty-One Pilots tribute band. Either way, to watch them play has been more thrilling than any Glastonbury. Long-serving conservative MPs, such as Ken Clarke and Nicholas Soames (the latter is none other than Winston Churchill’s grandson—Soames is so deeply and historically Tory that if you cut him open he would bleed blue) called out Johnson for his “serial disloyalty” and voted against the party, along with 19 other Tory MPs.
It was at this point that Brexit negotiations took an unprecedented turn. Johnson’s bill lost 328 votes to 301 this Wednesday, potentially stopping a No-Deal Brexit and causing each of the dissenting Tory MPs to be expelled from the party. The dramatically consequential moment, profound and audacious in its magnitude, echoes the chaos of Rubens’ violent masterpiece Consequences of War. Rubens’ cinematic tableau may have been painted in the midst of the Thirty-Years’ War in the 17th century, yet still has all the clamour and clatter of today’s Westminster. The woman pictured to the left, throwing her arms skyward, was Rubens’s artistic allegory of a despairing Europe—horribly fitting.
“Sit up, man!”
Left: 'Ophelia', John Everett Millais, image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. Right: Jacob Rees Mogg, image courtesy of BBC.
For a man so preoccupied with manners, the notoriously Victorian, Conservative MP Jacob Rees-Mogg’s now immortalised slouch showed an utter disregard for good posture. In a stance that embodies the essence of the current Tory leadership (read: petulant and laconic), the MP’s aesthetic shifted from that of a Dickens’ villain to a Pre-Raphaelite-damsel, as he slumped into his parliamentary seat like a drowned Ophelia. Unlike Millais’ subject, Rees-Mogg is no victim. Instead, the attention-seeking MP showed little other than cockiness and disregard as he repeatedly ignored requests from fellow MPs to “sit up straight”. Giggling, like a smug school-boy, Rees-Mogg’s stance spawned what I hereby term ‘Mogg-Spreading’. Think man-spreading, but with increased measures of entitlement and a healthy dash of antiquity. Can’t think his beloved nanny would be best-pleased.
“Big Girl’s Blouse”
'La Blouse Roumaine', Henri Matisse. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
“Call an election you great big girl’s blouse”, Johnson appeared to jibe at Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn during his inaugural Prime Minister Questions. It might be an outdated and derogatory remark, but from Johnson, who has forged a career on his blundering boarding-school-boy rhetoric, it’s entirely unsurprising. Loaded with tiresome sexist undertones, the remark immediately went viral on social media. Pleasingly, the trusty women of twitter were quick to reclaim the phrase, with the tongue in cheek #BigGirlsBlouse rounding off hundreds of self-appraising tweets. “Today in my #BigGirlsBlouse I will be creating content for a campaign raising awareness of the extent of violence against women and girls in London,” reads one. “Today in my #BigGirlsBlouse I had a meeting about my charity of which I am a trustee that supports children and siblings with disabilities,” jeers another. If that’s what being a big girls blouse is, then sign me up.
“Poisoned Apple”
'The Son of Man', Rene Magritte. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
Boris Johnson’s offer of a general election is like “the offer of a poisoned apple to Snow White from the wicked Queen,” mused Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. “What he’s offering is not an apple, or even an election, but the poison of a No-Deal,” Corbyn stated, in a metaphor that echoes Rene Magritte’s ghostly Son of Man. The painting, which features a suitably Corbyn-esque red tie and the aforementioned fruit, was said by Magritte to represent the conflict “between the visible that is hidden and the visible that is present”—a suitable description given Johnson’s “tremendous skill for keeping a straight face whilst being so disingenuous” (MP Ken Clarke’s words, not ours).
“#overandout”
'Cain and Abel', Tiziano Vecelli. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
As of midday Thursday, Johnson is standing down—just not the one you might have hoped for. “In recent weeks I’ve been torn between family loyalty and the national interest,” said Conservative MP and brother to Boris, Jo Johnson in a tweet. “It’s an unresolvable tension & time for others to take on my roles as MP & Minister. #overandout.” Following the purge of the 21 Tory-Rebel MPs, Johnson’s resignation is another crushing blow for the PM and the Tory party at large, made especially potent by the fact that the Johnsons are actual brothers. The whole story, heaving with drama and familial strains, feels biblical, and Titian’s theatrical oil-rendition of brotherly betrayal, Cain and Abel, springs to mind.
“London’s Burning”
'The Burning of the House of Lords and Commons', JMW Turner. Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
And finally, as we await the House of Lords to confirm an anti No-Deal bill this Friday, Brexit steadily hurtles into even more uncertain terrain. Therefore, what better image to round this list off than Turner’s The Burning of the Houses of Lords and Commons. The past three years have been defined by unrest, discord, and the general feeling that absolutely no one, MPs and civilians alike, has the slightest semblance of what is actually happening. It’s almost like no one warned us that Brexit was set to be a seismic catastrophe ?!?!!! That in mind, I think Turner’s work—a blazing mass of political flames—speaks for itself.