This stark black-and-white illustration speaks volumes without uttering a word. A lone rat, clad in oversized military fatigues and a dented helmet, sits atop a crumbling, stylized rat skull carved from stone. There’s no battlefield in sight, no enemy present—only the crushing stillness that follows purpose, orders, and loss. The rat doesn’t stand at attention or brandish a weapon. It sits. Still. Heavy. Watching.
The image is more than clever anthropomorphism—it’s a biting metaphor. The rat, long a symbol of expendability, filth, and sacrifice in the shadows of society, is reimagined here as a soldier. A “nobody” in uniform. The heavy lines and minimal palette amplify the bleakness, encouraging the viewer to linger in discomfort.
The giant skull beneath him is not just literal—it’s a monument to those before him, to the fallen, forgotten, and ignored. It isn’t a hero’s memorial with flowers and fanfare; it’s an unmarked grave in the shape of himself.
This piece doesn’t glorify war—it questions who is sent and what we’ve come to accept as just. In its simplicity, it holds a devastating critique: that for many, service is synonymous with disposability. That we can clothe vermin in honor, send them to die, and then forget the cost once they disappear into the soil.
“Private Vermin” is a work of anti-war reflection wrapped in rodent imagery. But don’t be fooled by the small frame of the protagonist. There’s nothing small about the message it carries:
Even rats bleed. Even rats are remembered—when someone chooses not to forget.