Faculty of Design

Illustration

Mark Krzepis

Bonaparte’s Filter Cigarettes

A cigarette advertisement based on David’s “Napoleon Crossing the Alps”

“By merging Jacques-Louis David’s painting of Napoleon crossing the Alps with the Marlboro man, this painting calls into question ideas of “coolness” and masculinity. The bravado found in David’s painting is carried on in many cowboy related ephemera: harmful ideas packaged into epic imagery. The motif of a man on a horse is hyperbolic enough to make you serve your emperor or serve big tobacco — I think Ken said it best in the Barbie movie.”