Eisenman argues that the complex of violent and sexual motifs found in the Abu Ghraib photographs constitutes an instance of a longstanding Western "pathos formula" whereby victims are shown taking pleasure in their own chastisement and pain. This cruel formula is wide spread in the history of art and visual culture from Hellenistic Greece to modern times.
Contents
Resemblance -- Freudian slip -- Documents of barbarism -- Pathos formula -- Stages of cruelty -- Muscle and bone -- Theater of cruelty -- Orientalism -- Afterword: What is Western art?
