黑色污点

When France lost the Franco-Prussian War in 1871, it also lost Alsace and much of Lorraine to the new German Empire. Bettannier grew up in Metz, right inside the ceded territory, and chose French citizenship rather than stay a German subject. 16 years later he painted this schoolroom. A teacher stands his pupils in front of a wall map of France and points at the lost provinces, coloured a solid black, the tache noire or black stain of the title. The boys are the generation being raised to take the land back. Bettannier hangs a drum in the corner and lets the dark blackboard loom behind the class, so the geography lesson keeps sliding toward a military one.