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Journalism of Courage
Written by Saima Mehta
Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara was born on June 14, 1928. Even 50 years after his death, he remains a cult figure, an icon of revolutionary struggles across the world.
Even those who do not know him, have likely still seen the iconic image Guerrillero Heroico, clicked by Cuban photographer Alberto Korda on March 5, 1960. Clicked during a funeral service in Havana, the image shows Che in a moment of contemplation, his gaze fixed on the horizon.
Today, this picture can be seen on all kinds of merchandise. In popular culture, it has become a symbol of resistance and rebellion, even though its blatant commercialisation is a far cry from Che’s own revolutionary polictics. Here is a look.
Icon of resistance, rebellion
The continuing resonance of Che’s image comes from what the man himself represented. An Argentine Marxist revolutionary, Che was a major figure in the Cuban Revolution, leading the guerrilla campaign that eventually deposed the US-backed dictator Fulgencio Batista in 1959.
In 1965, he left for Congo to (unsuccessfully) begin a revolution there, before going to Bolivia to do the same. He was captured and summarily executed by CIA-assisted Bolivian forces in 1967.
In left-wing circles, Che thus became a martyr, and an icon of Revolution. His writings, which drew from his own personal experiences of poverty and injustice in Latin America, and made poetic invocations of class struggle, added to this aura.
Amidst the 1960s-70s’ counterculture movement in the West, when many felt disillusioned with mainstream politics, he became someone who represented the idea of rebelling against the status quo. His iconic beret, beard, and intense gaze in Guerrillero Heroico were immortalised in countless works of art, music and literature, as well as wielded by anti-establishment political movements around the world.
As Che’s image became a cultural phenomenon, it also saw widespread commercialisation. Today, it can be found plastered across consumer products, from t-shirts to iPhone cases. In a consumer culture which thrives on individualism, Che’s revolutionary symbolism has come to stand as a form of individual rebellion — wearing a Che t-shirt is simply a cool expression of one’s opposition to the status quo, fuelled by a romanticised idea of rebellion.
Many wearers do not understand or fully agree with Che’s Marxist politics, but that does not matter. Over time, the image’s revolutionary symbolism has lost much of its meaning, with the staunchly anti-capitalist Che becoming a ‘brand’, used by companies to sell more products.
As Michael Casey wrote in his book Che’s Afterlife: Legacy of an Image (2009): “Che’s afterlife is defined by a central tension… the commoditization of an anticapitalist rebel who opposed all that his hypercommercialised image now represents.”
The author is an intern with The Indian Express.
