The Role of Art in a Time of War
High on a wall of the Palazzo Pitti, in Florence, hangs a famous painting that Rubens completed in the last years of his life.

At its center is Mars, the god of war, surging out in battle armor from the doors of the Temple of Janus.

In Roman peacetime, this temple’s gates were always closed. Now they have burst open, and the frenzy has begun.

Beneath Mars’s feet lie victims about to be trampled. You see a mother looking up with terror at the gathering violence, desperate to protect her wailing child.

Next to her are two figures who have fallen to the ground and are on the verge of destruction. One is a woman with a lute, her instrument already broken. Another is a personified Architecture, his compass falling from his hand.

These are “The Consequences of War,” as Rubens saw them in 1638. Civilians suffer, but not only them; culture is a casualty too.