THE APOLLO BELVEDERE	INGRES, THE APOTHEOSIS OF HOMER

Greece and Rome is a survey of the major monuments of Ancient Greek and Roman art and architecture--with emphasis on the cities of Athens and Rome. The class will study not only the ancient monuments themselves, but the history of their discovery and/or excavation as well as their importance in the later western European tradition. We will consider how the way we know ancient art works--through fragments, ancient and modern copies and interpretative museum exhibits-- affects our understanding. Students will gain an appreciation of the historical significance of ancient monuments and how they have affected and continue to influence, for better or worse, subsequent art and culture. By reading primary sources and a variety of art historical texts, we will examine how ancient works of art and architecture have been variously interpreted through the centuries and seek to develop an understanding of changing concepts of "the classical."

The stories of the Iliad and Odyssey are central to western European art and literature. They have been depicted countless times in the visual arts. Some examples:

A fragment of Greek Geometric pottery illustrating perhaps the abduction of Helen, eighth century b.c. It was made during the period when the oral epics were just beginning to take written form.

The Francois Vase depiction of the funeral games of Patroclus, 570 b.c.

A black-figured amphora painted in Athens, c. 540 b.c. by Exekias one of the greatest archaic painters shows Ajax and Achilles playing draughts.

The Ambrosian Iliad, leaves from a sixth century a.d. illustrated version of the Iliad, made in Constantinople. Note that it was copied and illustrated in a period when Christianity had long been the official religion of the Roman empire.
Battle Scene
Achilles
Nestor and Patroclus

Later European painters illustrated the epics especially in the 17^th through 19^th centuries, when the classics were regarded as the most worthy subjects for history painting.

Peter Paul Rubens, Judgment of Paris, c. 1638

Rubens spent many years in Rome and knew ancient (Roman) art works at first hand. Heeven wrote a Treatise, On the Imitation of Statues.

"In order to attain the highest perfection in painting it is necessary to understand the antiques, nay to be so thoroughly possessed of this knowledge that it may diffuse itself everywhere. Yet it must be judiciously applied, and so that it may not in the least smell of the stone....It is certain, however, that as the finest statues are extremely beneficial, so the bad are not only useless be even pernicious.

David, active in the French Revolution, used dramatic images from the classical past not only for their inherent drama, but also as moral lessons, before and during the Revolution. The discovery of Pompeii in the late 18th century encouraged the fascination with classical culture and provided more sources for classical imagery.

Ingres, Ambassadors of Agamemnon in the tent of Achilles, 1801
Apotheosis of Homer, 1827

Ingres’ painting style was strongly influenced by classical art. An influential member of the French Academy he insisted on the superiority of "the classical." a style that emphasized precise drawing over color.

Specific Greek and Roman images have been used as inspiration by artists over the centuries. Most ancient sculptures especially Greek bronzes have been lost over the centuries and are known only through Roman copies. The Romans prized Greek sculpture and created hundreds of copies of famous works. Some of these copies were rediscovered during the Renaissance and avidly collected by Italian humanists. Many more were found during the 16th-17th centuries and formed the core of great Roman collections, e.g. the Papal collections, and those of families like the Borghese and Barberini families. By the 18th century much ancient sculpture was in western European collections as well including Greek originals like the Elgin marbles which were brought to England in 1803.

Apollo Belvedere, Roman copy of original by Leochares
Canova, Perseus, 1804-8

A famous example is the Apollo Belvedere, known in a Roman copy and displayed prominently in the Vatican collections was copied over and over again. It was considered the most beautiful sculpture ever made in the 18th century, although today its reputation has faded. A very direct copy is Canova's Perseus.

Laocoon, Hellenistic Greek sculpture, 2nd century b.c. (Although some believe that it may have been made by Greek sculptors working for the Romans in the 1st century a.d.). It was described by Pliny the Elder and excavated in Rome in the early 16th century. Michelangelo was one of the first to see it. It was restored by Bernini in the 17th century, although his restorations have since been corrected.

Bernini, Pluto and Persephone

Bernini who in his youth restored ancient statues in the princely collections of Rome, used the head of the Laocoon as a model for his Pluto. Bernini read Ovid’s Metamorphoses in designing his version of the myth of Pluto and Persephone. His sculpture is very comparable to the painting of the same subject from Vergina.

Tomb at Vergina, Painting of Pluto and Persephone, 3rd quarter of the 4th century b.c.

A rare example of an original late classical Greek painting found in Vergina, northern Greece in 1978 in the "Great Tumulus," which also contained a tomb believed to be that of Philip II of Macedonia.

Michelangelo, Bacchus, 1497
David, 1501-4

Michelangelo was also directly inspired by ancient sculpture. In fact, his works were an attempt to rival works of the ancients.

Dionysus, Hellenistic Sculpture
Doryphoros, Roman copy of original by Polykleitos

Aphrodite from Knidos, Roman copy of original by Praxiteles
Crouching Venus, Roman Copy of original by Doidalsos
Medici Venus
Hellenistic Venus

Botticelli, Birth of Venus, 1482
Rubens, Andromeda, c. 1635
Ingres, Venus Anadymene, 1848
Bougereau, Birth of Venus, 1863
Canova, Venus, 1810
Greek Slave, Hiram Powers,1846

The image of Aphrodite has also been copied many times over the centuries. Botticelli's Birth of Venus is based closely on the Medici Venus which he studied.

Rubens Andromeda, copied from a classical Venus type, is an illustration of his theories of translating sculptural images into painting.

In the 19th century classical art provided authoritative models for the Neo-Classical artists who attempted to emulate not only classical types, but also rendered classical subject matter. They attempted archaeological accuracy in the depiction of details of costume and setting.

The English artist Frederick Lord Leighton painted classical types. His addresses to the Royal Academy expound on his theory of the arts, contrasting Aryan art which was most perfectly represented by classical Greek art and Semitic/Christian art, vastly inferior. Only with the revival of humanism and with the renewed study of nature, the human physique, and classical art, will Aryanism ever triumph again. He also wanted the artists themselves to look Aryan and Greek. He wanted a nation, a population, of bodies that were Polykleitan, Praxitelean, Pheidian. He exhorted young artists to take up physical culture.

Frederick Lord Leighton, Daedelus and Icarus, 1869
Psyche, 1889-90

Ideal of female beauty based on the classical type, the Aphrodite Callipygos. This statue illustrated a story in Athenaeus of two young Syracusan sisters who were discussing which of them had the better buttocks. Unable to decide, they stopped a passing young man and asked his opinion. Another young man chose the other sister. The two couples married and dedicated a temple to Aphrodite Callipygos.

Psyche’s name means soul. After her affair with Eros, Psyche and Aphrodite were reconciled and Psyche went to live in the goddess’s palace. Her toilet preparations involve the soul’s purgation and preparation for a new life in the service of the goddess of love and beauty.

Unilinear Scale of Human Races and Lower Relatives according to Nott & Gliddon  (from Stephen J. Gould, The Mismeasure of Man)

In the nineteenth century, the classical ideal was even seen as a the culmination of biological selection/evolution. Illustration showing the head of the Apollo Belvedere with heads of white (Aryan) male, African male and chimpanzee. Lord Byron, familiar with classical sculpture, was extremely disappointed with the appearance of modern Greeks who didn’t resemble the sculptures at all.

This obsession with the classical ideal as an expression of a superior race found its most extreme and ominous development in Nazi Germany, where the classical was revived and an attempt was made to associate art and athletics during the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. The classical was also important to Mussolini who favored the heroic neoclassical style seen in many Fascist sculptures in Rome. As an aspect of this connection with the glories of the Roman empire, Mussolini sponsored extensive excavations of classical monuments. His new suburb EUR on the outskirts of Rome is an example of the revival of the classical in a stripped down modern version.

Temple of Apollo, Corinth, c. 600 b.c.
Parthenon, 447-436 b.c.
Maison Carée, Nimes, 19 b.c.
Jefferson, Virginia State Capitol, Richmond, 1785
The Pantheon, 125-128 a.d.
Palladio, Villa Rotunda Vicenza, 1566/7
Lord Burlington, Chiswick House, London 1725
Jefferson, Monticello, 1768-1809
Vignon, Paris, La Madeleine, 1806-1828
Strickland, Second Bank of U.S. (Customs House), Philadelphia, 1818-1824

The classical orders have formed a language of architecture that is fundamental to western architecture. Like figural imagery, classical architecture was emulated in the Renaissance. It was reproduced more precisely in examples of neo-classical architects such as Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson regarded the classical orders as paradigms for the creation of rational and beautiful architecture. The classical orders have thoroughly dominated the western tradition in architecture, being revived most recently by "Post Modern" architects.