«Apotheosis of War—Nanjing»,Bai Yu

Divided into panels, the composition depicts a wartime atrocity: at upper left, soldiers march bound, undressed captives past onlookers; at center, an armored commander stands atop a mound above rows of slain, half-clothed bodies, including a small child in red seated among them; at right, a man in a red shirt carries a limp body past more dead. Below, crowds of civilians — men, women, children, some bound or led at gunpoint — react with grief and horror.

Earthy ochre, brown, and grey tones dominate, with pale flesh and dark uniforms set against a hazy orange-streaked sky. Rendered in a heavy, sculptural realism with strong contour lines and somber shadow, the vast scale and repeated poses of anguish create an intense atmosphere.