THE ROMAN ART

THE ROMAN ART

INTRODUCTION

Roman art has often been considered less important than Greek art, and Neo-Classicism helped to disseminate the notion that Greek idealism was superior to Roman realism. For a long time, there was a refusal to consider Roman art in its own right rather than as a pale reflection of Greek art, which was regarded as intellectual, abstract and philosophical, where Roman art was seen as mundane, concrete and historical. These profound conceptual differences can be observed in representations of war, battle and victory over foreign peoples. In their depictions of such events, the Greeks used myths, in which the most civilized combatant, the positive element of the narrative, was destined to achieve victory; the images show struggles between gods and giants, centaurs and apiths and Greeks and Amazons. In Roman art, myth and religion give way to the historical reality depicted in the narratives traditionally displayed on triumphal columns. This contrast between almost abstract representation and reliefs sometimes regarded as almost cinematographic in their narrative of events clearly demonstrates the objective and symbolic difference between these two forms of artistic expression.

The difficulty experienced by Roman art in achieving a purely aesthetic, unfettered form of expression, together with ha dependence on social and political context, are sometimes regarded as having prevented artists from flourishing freely in the Roman world. Artists seemed always constrained by social and religious expectations, to the depiction of political or judicial activities, the sacred function of art, and of gapes and spectacles: that is, scenes of everyday life.

These difficulties in defining an aesthetic were compounded by the fact that during both the Republican and Imperial eras Roman art had to confront the dominance of Hellenism. The Greek form of artistic expression proved able to outlast official Roman art. This formal continuity was not due solely to the Roman taste for Greek art; it also reflected the strength of tradition, which can be clearly seen in the religious iconography and the correlations between Greek and Roman gods, despite the importance of the Italic world (Minerva, for example, derives from the Etruscan goddess Menvra rather than the Greek Athena).

This phenomenon persisted during the early centuries of the Christian era, as can be seen in the transition from the Greek Nike through the Roman Victory to the Christian angel, from Orpheus to the representation of David or Christ, and from the ancient philosophers to the Christian apostles, etc.

Another aspect of the pervasiveness of Hellenism in Roman art was the demand among the upper classes in Roman society for works of Greek art. Contact with Greek art led to the development of a passion for collecting that gradually permeated the Roman world, particularly following the conquests of Southern Italy, Greece and Asia Minor. Imported works of art enjoyed enormous prestige in Rome, but at the same time, paradoxically, certain groups in the upper strata of Roman society began to reject foreign works of art on the grounds that their arrival in Rome was one of the principal causes of the breakdown of traditional morality. Cicero bears witness to the existence of genuine connoisseurs of Greek art and, as can be seen at Hadrian’s villa at Tivoli and at many other sites, replicas of Greek sculptures and Roman interpretations of Greek models were given absolute pride of place. Yet Roman art existed in its own right, and original sculpture was produced in a wide range of different fields.

The taste for narrative relief, evocation of the artistic characteristics of earlier centuries, a sense of setting, the place of sculpture in architecture and the individualization of portraits are all aspects that help to define Roman art, despite the changes that occurred over the centuries. Trends in official art, whether patrician or imperial, stand in contrast to the evolution of popular or plebeian trends. It was only from the third century onwards that the second tendency began to show spectacular development in the field of sculpture, and that development continued until the Early Middle Ages. A distinction has to be made between public and private sculpture, between urban and rural sculpture and between exports of finished products and local production, and some attempt also has to be made to take account of the enormous geographical scope of Roman art.

In seeking to understand Roman art in the context of the society that consumed it, it has to be asked whether Roman art is that of the city of Rome and of the regions under the direct influence of the capital and its immediate surroundings, or whether the term is taken to refer generally to the art of the Ancient World during the Roman period. The merging of the arts of the capital with those indigenous to North Africa, the Orient, the Iberian Peninsula, Gaul and Germania gave rise to provincial forms of artistic expression that helped to give Roman art its originality and diversity. It was not until the centuries immediately following the founding of the city of Rome that the region of central Italy began to play a central role in defining Roman art. Subsequently, Roman art came to incorporate the full variety of styles denying from regions politically dependent on Rome.

The study of Roman sculpture dates back to the Middle Ages and the Renaissance. During the latter period, in particular, artists discovered Rome and its ancient monuments, and collectors developed a passion for the art of the Classical period. During the sixteenth century, many ancient monuments in Rome were converted and restored to use, but the search for outstanding pieces very often took precedence over the conservation of surviving complexes. Thus Bramante, who methodically excavated the Forum, making careful note of everything that he discovered, had no compunction about destroying a monument that he had just been studying in order to make use of the materials. At the time, the conservation of ancient remains was guided more by notions of artistic value than historical interest, and efforts were concentrated on saving the most beautiful architectural items, such as colonnades, large ornamental bosses or coffered domes, and sculptures in particular; the latter were put on display in palaces and residences. Shortly after his installation in Rome in 1552, Cardinal du Bellay had gardens laid out in the western section of the Baths of Diocletian next to his palace, in order to display the large number of sculptures in his collection to maximum effect.

The site then comprised two large rotundas, linked by a hemicycle with steps and, in the wall surmounting it, a large number of niches designed to accommodate the most valuable of his sculptures. This Renaissance transformation of an ancient building is proof of the importance the Humanists ascribed to Roman sculpture, for which they attempted to reconstruct a picturesque, mannerist setting. Enthusiasm for Roman Antiquity continued throughout the seventeenth century, with studies and compendiums like those made by Bosio or Ciampini. Scholarship, travel and the development of archaeology eventually combined in the eighteenth century to supply a scientific definition of the art of Antiquity. J.J. Winckelmann broke with baroque thinking to defend the ancient heritage, which he saw as essentially Greek. He travelled, studied extant works of art at first hand and compiled catalogues. His Unpublished Monuments of Antiquity, exploined ond illustroted

(1767), or his History of Ancient Art (1764), were instrumental in forming eighteenth-century European taste. For the first time, more attention was paid to sculpture than to painting. Winckelmann’s ideas held sway throughout the nineteenth century and are still influential in the twentieth. They have not, however, been helpful for the study of Roman art, because he attempted to identify a specific period of Greek art with “Art” as such, thereby giving Greek art a position of pre-eminence over Roman.

In the nineteenth century, Jakob Burckhardt (1818—1897) in defining cultural history drew a parallel between political history and the history of art. He applied his method to the Italian Renaissance, to Greek sculpture and to Late Antiquity, explaining the transition from paganism to Christianity in his work on Constantine the Great (1853). But it was left to two Viennese historians of medieval and modern art, Franz Wickhoff (1853—1909) and Alois Riegl (1858—1905), to recognize the originality of Roman art. As they saw it, three elements defined the artistic language unique to the Roman world: the portrait, the continuous narrative relief, and the introduction of perspective and landscape elements into painting and relief sculpture.

Another aspect of the discovery of Roman sculpture, as with Greek sculpture, was the growing importance of archaeological discoveries and explorations during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Gradually, as major excavations got under way, people began to take an interest in Roman sculpture for its own sake, rather than as a means of tracing Greek originals. The first excavations at Herculaneum were undertaken in I7tt, and between 1738 and 1766 the whole site was systematically explored. In 1748, work began on Pompeii, where less effort was required because the layer of lava covering the remains was thinner and there was a greater admixture of ash. As archaeological methods progressed, different aspects of daily life in a Roman town began to emerge. Finally, in 1809, work was started on the Roman Forum.