Photo Credit: Reuters

One Friday night, over the dark tides of the Seine, the river that cuts through the body of Paris, the ancient city of Catholic and secular faith, a metal horse with a rider on it appeared. It came from the Pont d'Austerlitz, galloping toward the Eiffel Tower. Water poured out that night, as rain from above, as a river from below.

Water - the goddess Sеquana, a metaphor for time. W.G. Sebald used it in his masterpiece Austerlitz:

If Newton thought, said Austerlitz, pointing through the window and down to the curve of the water around the Isle of Dogs glistening in the last of the daylight, if Newton really thought that time was a river like the Thames, then where is its source and into what sea does it finally flow? Every river, as we know, must have banks on both sides, so where, seen in those terms, where are the banks of time? What would be this river’s qualities, qualities perhaps corresponding to those of water, which is fluid, rather heavy, and translucent? In what way do objects immersed in time differ from those left untouched by it? Why do we show the hours of light and darkness in the same circle? Why does time stand eternally still and motionless in one place, and rush headlong by in another? Could we not claim, said Austerlitz, that time itself has been nonconcurrent over the centuries and the millennia? It is not so long ago, after all, that it began spreading out over everything. And is not human life in many parts of the earth governed to this day less by time than by the weather, and thus by an unquantifiable dimension which disregards linear regularity, does not progress constantly forward but moves in eddies, is marked by episodes of congestion and irruption, recurs in ever-changing form, and evolves in no one knows what direction?

As the horse passed over the surface, somewhere out of the darkness on both sides of the river, the surprised exclamation of the crowd could be heard. The people on the banks, watching this mystical figure, this magical image, were soaked by the rain. The color of the horse was gray with a thin yellow tinge, sparkling and metallic. It was not the color of decay. Rather, it was the color of a miracle: dead matter brought to life. The iron horse was called the "centerpiece of the ceremony" by Sanofi, the multinational pharmaceutical and healthcare company that commissioned it.

That night, Paris and the world celebrated the opening of the Olympic Games. According to some reports, the Opening Ceremony of the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris was the most watched event of its kind ever. 28.6 million people are said to have looked at this celebration and saw what their own eyes wanted to see: a celebration of diversity, a show, a boring kitsch, an LGBT party, the beginning of a great sporting event, an insult to religious feelings.

The horse itself was nothing. A well-made puppet. Later, it seemed, it didn't even come close to the ambitious "centerpiece of the ceremony." It disappeared almost instantly as an image from the public eye and memory. But the Olympic games in themselves are also nothing. They were reborn in 1892, 1500 years after they were banned by the Roman emperor Theodosius I. Theodosius was a Christian, and the ancient Olympics were part of a centuries-old religious festival honoring the Greek god Zeus, so the emperor took the initiative to get rid of them. Appearance and reappearance, being and nothingness, all depend on the sudden change of perspective.

The Olympic Games are only what we (will) make of them: a festival celebrating Greek paganism, or a stage where the human spirit, will, and power converge in peaceful competition, where the deeply human passion for combat, victory, and fame is not stained with blood and hatred, but cultivated and celebrated. They could also be a stage for political messages and intrigue, or another stage for the war on culture.

Equestrianism has always been a part of the games, and the metallic horse running across the Seine was not an unlikely symbol of this ancient rite and celebration. In fact, equestrian events have always been among the most prominent of the Olympic Games.

The horse was commissioned by one of the main sponsors of the Paris Olympics, Sanofi. Paul Hudson, the company’s chief executive officer, said,

A symbol of resilience, peace, solidarity and unity, this ‘horse’ galloping across Paris perfectly embodies the values that have been at the heart of the partnership between Sanofi and Paris 2024 since it was signed in 2021. More than a powerful symbol, the horse is also the result of the know-how and spirit of scientific and artistic innovation of a French company based in the Nantes region.

After the ride, the horse will be exhibited at La Maison Sanofi and then donated to a museum so that “as many people as possible can discover this work of art.”

As a work of art and an idea, the Sanofi horse is not original. Horses have always been symbols of something, of stories and myths. Sanofi’s officer described their horse as a symbol of “peace, solidarity, and unity.” But it is actually the opposite. Perhaps the most popular horse in art is the Trojan horse. A work of art, not of metal, but of wood, a kind of technological miracle, the Trojan horse was a victory trophy that turned out to be a hiding place for a hidden enemy. Through the pharmaka of the wooden horse, the otherwise impenetrable citadel of Troy get exposed. The usual banalities in Sanofi's message, however, did not obscure the fact that the horse is also a “result” of "know-how and the spirit of scientific and artistic innovation".

Sanofi's horse and the promotional video depicting its meticulous production were very similar to the intro of the first season of Westworld, the no less iconic HBO series about a company that celebrates "know-how" and the "spirit of scientific and artistic innovation". The production of the silicon horse in the Westworld series is even more impressive as an image and presentation of scientific progress than Sanofi's one-and-a-half-minute clip.

In fact, the entire Westworld series is about a kind of games, where people with the financial means can participate in a competition that is as close to reality as possible, but where the deeply human passion for fight, victory and fame is stained with blood and sometimes hatred. A passion that is not cultivated, but encouraged and, most importantly and amazingly, left without any consequences. A great artistic idea that presents the possibility of the emergence of a future utilitarian world controlled by profit, technology and surveillance.

The image of the "pale horse" has never carried a positive message. It may be a symbol of resilience, but never of "peace, solidarity and unity". It is, as I said, rather an image of destruction and war. The Sanofi horse's gallop from Austerlitz, a reminder of the Battle of Austerlitz, in which Napoleon Bonaparte's army defeated the combined Russian and Austrian armies, and which is considered one of Napoleon's greatest victories, ended at the foot of the Eiffel, where the pale horseman offered the folded Olympic flag, turned upside down (with the rings of Asia and Oceania at the top), not to a group of children or athletes (for example), but to four representatives of the French army and police, who raised it as it is, upside down. Reality is what we put into it: it can always be a kind of mirror distortion.

Photo Credit: Reuters

Four horses represent the plagues that await the earth and mankind in the Book of Revelation. The last one is the pale horse, the only one of the three that is not ridden by a "being," but by Death itself:

I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beasts of the earth.

The ancient Greeks believed that the name Hades meant "the unseen" (aeides), the one hidden in darkness, the invisible, but Socrates questioned this view, describing him rather as eidenai, the one who has knowledge of "all that is fine and beautiful." In fact, the discussion of the meaning of the name Hades was in Plato's dialogue Cratylus, which was devoted to the meaning of signs (names), to the puzzling question of whether we can call a thing what we want it to be in order to be what it is, or whether the thing itself should give us the name, should reveal itself as a sign that we would universally accept, or, finally, whether the sign hides or obscures the thing it refers to rather than showing it. At the root of these questions, of course, is reality. Is the thing we see what we put into it, or is it something else, independent of the meaning we give it? And also, does everything have its own name, or is it we who call it that?

The general introduction to the Cratylus Dialogue offered by classical scholars says that the Greeks were very interested in the subject of names or signs and reality, a debate that has become obsolete in modern times. But the reception of the Olympic celebration in Paris belies the scholarly view; the ceremony became very much a matter of dispute, precisely over the meaning of what different people say (or express) and see. Was the opening ceremony a "celebration of diversity," a "show," "boring kitsch," an "LGBT party," the "opening of a great sporting event," or an "insult to religious sensibilities"?

The pale horse didn't become a point of debate, however. No one asked why it should be interpreted as a symbol of "peace" and "unity." Also, Sanofi expected it to be the "centerpiece" of the show that would be remembered, but that part somewhat escaped wider public attention. The rider of the horse appeared and was probably only remembered for his final stunt, in which he offered an Olympic flag that was raised backwards. Again, no one asked what the horse really represented and whether it was really a symbol of peace and unity. Few have considered what "reality" depicts an artificial horse galloping over water or what a blunder it is to reverse the usual order of continental rings. The "centerpiece" that grabbed the attention and caused a great roar, disagreement and dissatisfaction among the spectators was the "Dionysian" celebration somewhere in the middle of the show.

Organizers and spectators alike could not agree on the meaning of this scene, which included colorful drag queens, a transgender model and a singer dressed as the Greek god of wine. What was it: a reference to the pagan origins of the Olympics or a coded insult to the Christian spectators who were once responsible for banning the games for 1500 years? As we can see, the old dispute among the ancient Greeks about the meaning of signs, names, and reality has not disappeared. On the contrary, it is vigorously practiced, even if not consciously understood as such.

The organizers were initially silent about the scene. When Christians complained that the image was a distorted replica (and mockery) of Leonardo da Vinci's "The Last Supper," the organizers were forced to explain and apologize. “Clearly there was never an intention to show disrespect to any religious group. [The opening ceremony] tried to celebrate community tolerance,” the Paris 2024 spokesperson Anne Descamps told a press conference. “We believe this ambition was achieved. If people have taken any offence, we are really sorry.” In other words, the performance was not a parody of one of the most recognizable biblical episodes.

Wine is an important symbol of Christianity. Christ's first miracle was to turn water (time) into wine (joy) on the last day of the wedding feast. Wine appeared at the Last Supper and then became a means of remembrance. Wine is at the heart of the most important Christian ritual: The Holy Communion. But it is also a prominent symbol of ancient Greek religion, of Dionysus, the pagan god of winemaking, fertility, ritual madness, religious ecstasy and theater. For the organizers, the Dionysian bacchanalia was the right choice to raise awareness "of the absurdity of violence between human beings." For Christians, it was an example of intolerance and disrespect.

And now we are faced with the old question of culture and reality. Also, the question of the meaning of the signs (mediums or names) through which we communicate and through which culture itself functions. To return to Plato's Cratylus, the Greeks were very wise to argue about the meaning and importance of "signs". Their culture has survived for centuries, and is clearly still celebrated and reproduced, precisely because it reached the level of understanding that what we call or understand depends on what we are able to communicate. The Greeks understood that even if we don't have a definite answer to the meaning of names, of signs, we have a definite understanding of their importance in terms of reality and life.

The drag queen with the halo at the center of the "dinner table" could simply be Barbara Butch, the LGBTQ+ icon, or, if she was wearing a red dress, she could certainly be interpreted as the woman from the Book of Revelation, "clothed in purple and scarlet," glittering with gold, precious stones and pearls, holding "a golden cup in her hand, full of abominations and the filthiness of her adulteries." Too many symbols, too much art, for too large and diverse a public, with too different a culture, can only lead to confusion and a clash of realities.

Friedrich Nietzsche, the great cultural prophet of the 19th century, ended his last book, Ecce Homo, with these words: "Am I clear? Dionysus versus the Crucified."

What is clear for now is that the problem of culture and reality is persistent and not easily resolved. The most watched Olympic ceremony, held in Paris, the old Catholic capital of modern secular culture, predictably turned into a clash of realities. The opening ceremony could easily have been a celebration of the spirit of sport, in which all the good qualities of humanity are manifested. But that's not reality. At least, it is not the reality of modern culture.

Tsoncho Tsonchev has degrees in political science, history, and theology, and a Ph.D. in religious studies from McGill University. He is the editor of The Montreal Review and the author of The Political Theology of Augustine, Thomas Aquinas, and Reinhold Niebuhr: Essays in Political Theology and Christian Realism (The Montreal Review, 2018) and Person and Communion: The Political Theology of Nikolai Berdyaev (The Montreal Review, 2021).

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