Star-Spangled Banner is a series of twelve acrylic paintings on canvas by Ben Sakoguchi, created between 2003 and 2004. Each panel measures approximately twelve inches tall by fourteen inches wide. The panels are hung in a grid formation of three rows and four columns. Each painting follows a similar compositional structure: a bilingual text banner runs across the top, featuring a line from “The Star-Spangled Banner” (the United States national anthem) in both Spanish and English. Below this, the canvas is divided into three or four vertical sections, each containing imagery sourced from vintage photographs, postcards, and historical documentation. At the bottom of each panel, bold text labels in English categorize or contrast the images above, creating a system of comparison and critique. The American flag appears throughout the series in various forms—waving, draped on bodies, burning, worn as clothing, held by marchers, and integrated into commercial imagery. Sakoguchi juxtaposes images of patriotic display with moments of exclusion, protest, and contradiction in American history. In one panel titled “Y el hogar de los valientes” (“And the home of the brave”), the composition is split between “CORRECT” and “INCORRECT,” contrasting the iconic 1945 photograph of Marines raising the flag at Iwo Jima—an image that became one of the most celebrated and widely reproduced symbols of American military heroism—with a scene depicting the forced removal and internment of Japanese Americans during the same war. This juxtaposition reveals a devastating contradiction: while the United States fought for freedom abroad and Japanese American soldiers served in the U.S. military, over 120,000 Japanese Americans were forcibly relocated from their homes and imprisoned in incarceration camps on American soil. Another panel, inscribed “Sobre la tierra de los libres” (“O’er the land of the free”), divides into four sections labeled “LATIN AMERICAN,” “ASIAN AMERICAN,” “AFRICAN AMERICAN,” and “NATIVE AMERICAN.” The Latin American section shows children wearing headbands reading “MEXICO” while holding Mexican flags, alongside a Dodgers baseball player. The Asian American section depicts women in kimonos with white-painted faces holding fans decorated with American flag prints. The African American section shows a figure with white face paint holding a sign that reads “I AM A MAN,” with the word “VOTE” inscribed on his forehead. The Native American section shows a figure wearing traditional regalia patterned with repeating American flag motifs. A third panel features the text “A la luz del amanecer” (“By the dawn’s early light”) and categorizes scenes as “PRO AMERICAN,” “ANTI AMERICAN,” “ALL AMERICAN,” and “UN AMERICAN,” including images of protest, impeachment calls, and flag burning. Other panels address topics ranging from gender and morality to consumerism, censorship, art world hierarchies, and military interventions. One shows a KKK march in Washington, D.C., while another depicts Nazi youth groups marching alongside American flag imagery. The labels create stark, often ironic categories: “GOOD GIRL,” “BAD BOY,” “BUSTED”; “HIGH ART,” “LOW ART,” “GOOD ART,” “BAD ART”; “SOLD,” “CENSORED,” “US,” “THEM”; “DON’T,” “DO,” “DON’T.” Sakoguchi’s painting style is precise and illustrative, rendered with a deliberate flatness that recalls both postcard imagery and propaganda aesthetics. The vivid reds, blues, yellows, whites echo the palette of the American flag. By framing the series with bilingual translations of the national anthem and organizing each panel into contrasting English categories, the work places patriotic displays alongside exclusions, celebrations alongside protests, official narratives alongside suppressed ones.