Why was Théodore Géricault's The Raft of the "Medusa" so controversial? Consider both style and subject matter in your answer.

What will be an ideal response?

The ideal answer should include:
1. The subject is the 1816 shipwreck of the Medusa in which the captain, who was an incompetent aristocrat appointed by the newly restored monarchy for political reasons, reserved all the lifeboats for himself and his officers and consigned the 152 passengers and crew to a hastily built raft.
2. Géricault shows the moment when the 15 surviving passengers, who spent two weeks adrift subsisting on human flesh, first spotted their rescue ship.
3. By placing a black man at the top of the composition, Géricault suggests that freedom for all will occur only when the most oppressed member of society is emancipated.
4. French critics saw the painting as a political commentary; Liberals praised it for exposing the scandal, and royalists condemned it as sensationalist journalism rather than art.