The Bersaglieri

George Luks

National Gallery of Art

This painting depicts a military parade marching on a light orange street through a city adorned with countless colorful flags. The scene shows soldiers in olive uniforms walking in a long line towards the right, with a section at the front playing large golden instruments like tubas and horns. One of the soldiers at the front holds up a flag with long vertical stripes of green, red, and white, with a red, white, and gold crest in the center. On either side of the parade, the street is lined with onlookers painted in dots of white, tan, blue, black, and pink. The buildings in the background are painted in colorful shades of blue, white, tan and pink, and towards the left they fade into a misty blue-gray color. A large flag takes up the top right corner, and it has the same design as the one that the man in the parade is holding. The brushstrokes in the painting are thick and visible.