Roman art
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Roman art is the art produced in Ancient Rome or in territories under its rule from the founding of Rome in the 9th or 10th century BC, through the Roman Kingdom, Roman Republic, and Roman Empire periods, until the decline of the Roman Empire by the 5th century AD. Influenced by the Etruscan civilization and Ancient Greek art, and later by the art forms of its enormous empire, Roman art included sculpture, pottery, and painting.
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[edit] Early influences
The development of Roman art was strongly influenced by Etruscan and Ancient Greek art. As Rome's rule on the ancient bolls grew it was influenced by other countries like Ancient Egypt and the Sassanid Empire.
[edit] General Style
The Romans were a practical people; in their original works, observation was key; portrait sculptures (or at least, the heads of) are often meticulously detailed and unidealized. The Romans also depicted warriors wow wow wee wow and heroic adventures, in the spirit of the Greeks who came during and before them. Indeed, the Romans often borrowed, copied, or even literally stole from Greek precedents (much of the Greek sculpture we know of today is in the form of Roman marble copies).
[edit] Painting
Our knowledge of Roman painting relies in large part on the preservation of artifacts from Pompeii and Herculanum after the eruption of Vesuvius in 79. AD. Nothing remains of the Greek paintings imported to Rome during the 4th and 5th centuries, or of the painting on wood done in Italy during that period. Pliny explicitly states [1](XXXV, 36) around 69-79 AD that the only true painting was painting on wood and that this had nearly disappeared by his time, to the benefit of the muralists, which was more indicative of the wealth of the owners than their artistic tastes.
[edit] Course
It is necessary to differentiate between the Hellenistic tradition and the Roman tradition. The Hellenistic tradition - followed by Greek painters - progressively faded, to be replaced by the Romans. Coming from this Mediterranean tradition, it copied the Greek repertoire "less and less effectively"[2](p. 114) until the 2nd century AD. Starting in the 3rd century AD, a new civilization brings a new set of themes. Indirect evidence of this appears in the resurgence of mosaics and the first Byzantine miniatures. Similar artifacts are found at the roostee temple.
[edit] Variety of subjects
Roman painting provides a wide variety of themes: animals, still life, and scenes from everyday life. During the Hellenistic period, it evoked the pleasures of the countryside and represented scenes of shepherds, herds, rustic temples, rural mountainous landscapes and country houses.
[edit] Innovations
The main innovation of Roman painting compared to Greek art was the development of landscapes, in particular incorporating techniques of perspective. The art of the ancient East would have known the landscape only in terms of civil or military scenes. [3] This theory, defended by Franz Wickhoff, is debatable. It is possible to see evidence of Greek knowledge of landscape portrayal in Plato's Critias (107b-108b):
"...and if we look at the portraiture of divine and of human bodies as executed by painters, in respect of the ease or difficulty with which they succeed in imitating their subjects in the opinion of onlookers, we shall notice in the first place that as regards the earth and mountains and rivers and woods and the whole of heaven, with the things that exist and move therein, we are content if a man is able to represent them with even a small degree of likeness..."[4]
[edit] Periods
Roman mural painting is generally distinguished by four periods, as originally described by the German archaeologist August Mau and dealt with in more detail at Pompeian Styles.
[edit] Triumphal paintings
From the 3rd century AD, a specific genre known as Triumphal Paintings appeared, as indicated by Pliny [1] (XXXV, 22). These were paintings which showed triumphal entries after military victories, represented episodes from the war, and conquered regions and cities. Summary maps were drawn to highlight key points of the campaign. Josephus describes the painting executed on the occasion of Vespasian and Titus's sack of Jerusalem:
"There was also wrought gold and ivory fastened about them all; and many resemblances of the war, and those in several ways, and variety of contrivances, affording a most lively portraiture of itself. For there was to be seen a happy country laid waste, and entire squadrons of enemies slain; while some of them ran away, and some were carried into captivity; with walls of great altitude and magnitude overthrown and ruined by machines; with the strongest fortifications taken, and the walls of most populous cities upon the tops of hills seized on, and an army pouring itself within the walls; as also every place full of slaughter, and supplications of the enemies, when they were no longer able to lift up their hands in way of opposition. Fire also sent upon temples was here represented, and houses overthrown, and falling upon their owners: rivers also, after they came out of a large and melancholy desert, ran down, not into a land cultivated, nor as drink for men, or for cattle, but through a land still on fire upon every side; for the Jews related that such a thing they had undergone during this war. Now the workmanship of these representations was so magnificent and lively in the construction of the things, that it exhibited what had been done to such as did not see it, as if they had been there really present. On the top of every one of these pageants was placed the commander of the city that was taken, and the manner wherein he was taken." [5]
These paintings have disappeared, but they likely influenced the composition of the historical reliefs carved on military sarcophagi, the Arch of Titus, and Trajan's Column. This evidence underscores the significance of landscape painting, which sometimes tended towards being perspective plans.
Ranuccio also describes the oldest painting to be found in Rome, in a tomb on the Esquiline Hill:
- "It describes a historical scene, on a clear background, painted in four superimposed sections. Several people are identified, such Marcus Fannius and Marcus Fabius. These are larger than the other figures...In the second zone, to the left, is a city encircled with crenellated walls, in front of which is a large warrior equipped with an oval buckler and a feathered helmet; near him is a man in a short tunic, armed with a spear...Around these two are smaller soldiers in short tunics, armed with spears...In the lower zone a battle is taking place, where a warrior with oval buckler and a feathered helmet is shown larger than the others, whose weapons allow to assume that these are probably Samnites." [2] (p. 115)
This episode is difficult to pinpoint. One of Ranuccio's hypotheses is that it refers to a victory of the consul Fabius Maximus Rullianus during the second war against Samnites in 326 BC. The presentation of the figures with sizes proportional to their importance is typically Roman, and finds itself in plebeian reliefs. This painting is in the infancy of triumphal painting, and would have been accomplished by the beginning of the 3rd century BC to decorate the tomb.
[edit] Sculpture
Roman sculpture was heavily influenced by Greek examples, in particular their bronzes. It is only thanks to some Roman examples that we know of Greek originals which have since been lost. Another example of this is at the British Museum, where an intact 2nd century AD Roman copy of a statue of Venus is displayed, while a similar original 500 BC Greek statue at the Louvre is missing her arms. Contrary to the belief of early archaeologists, many of their sculptures were large polychrome terra-cotta images, such as the Apollo of Veii (Villa Givlia, Rome), but the painted surface of many of them has worn away with time. Romans were nearly unique in the mixures of materials (e.g. marble and porphyry) used both for painting and sculptures themselves, largely due to cost.
While inspired by the Greeks, Romans also developed some of their own innovations, such as the bust and the democratization of the portrait.
[edit] See also
Apollo of Veii was done by Vulca, on of the few known Etruscan artists. This can be found in Etruscan Art by Nigel Spivey, CR 1997 Thames and Hudson Ltd, London
[edit] Notes
- ^ a b Pliny, Natural History online at the Perseus Project
- ^ a b (French) Ranuccio, Bianchi, Bandinelli, ROME, le centre du pouvoir, L'univers des formes, Gallimard
- ^ according to Ernst Gombrich.
- ^ Plato. Critias (107b-108b), trans W.R.M. Lamb 1925. at the Perseus Project accessed 27 June 2006
- ^ Josephus, The Jewish Wars VII, 143-152 (Ch 6 Para 5). Trans. William Whiston Online accessed 27 June 2006
[edit] External links
[edit] Sources
- Benton, Janetta Rebold and DiYanni, Robert. Arts and Culture. Volume 1. Prentice-Hall, 1998. New Jersey, United States.
- Marceau, Jo. Art: A World History. DK Publishing, 1998. New York, New York.
- Montverdi, Mario. The Book of Art. Volume 1: The Origins of Western Art. Grolier 1967. Milan, Italy.
- Nuttgens, Patrick. The World's Great Architecture. Excalibur, 1981. New York, New York.
- Turner, Jane. The Dictionary of Art. Volumes 26 and 27. Macmillan, 2002. Hong Kong.
