La Bandera (The Flag)

The Flag juxtaposes the figure of a pregnant woman, representing family, with the backs of retreating male soldiers. The train car in the background alludes to the common method of transporting soldiers during the Mexican Revolution, while the flag denotes patriotic dedication to the cause. This lithograph was made during Orozco’s relocation to the United States between 1927 and 1934, and was created after an earlier work, a drawing from his Horrors of Revolution series (1926). Similar to Francisco de Goya’s famous Disasters of War, Orozco’s works chronicled atrocities committed during the Revolution. Orozco subsequently produced a suite of lithographs based on some of the less violent compositions from Horrors of Revolution, including The Flag, and marketed them to a U.S. audience.