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Image – Poster Showing the Overthrow of the Shah (1980)
Poster Showing the Overthrow of the Shah (1980) Page 1015
Chapter 29
Poster Showing the Overthrow of the Shah (1980) Page 1015
In the dense iconography that fills this poster, Khomeini appears in the role of Moses towering over the Shah. The desperate monarch, his crown already cracked and his sword broken, reaches for support from a composite figure of other enemies of Iran and Islam: Britain (the flag on the shirt front), the United States (the flag to which the Shah is clinging), and Israel (the Star of David on the hat). The small figures in the upper left corner undergo the tortures of hell awaiting those such as the shah. This poster combines the style of traditional Persian miniature painting with passages from the Quran.
Questions for Analysis
1. Which elements in the poster come across most forcefully? What impact would this poster have made on an impoverished Iranian?
2. How does this poster reflect the general mood of Americans in the late 1970s that it was going through a “crisis of confidence”?