‘Contemporary Classicism’ Copy of a Copy: Appropriating Classical Statues as Conceptual Readymades

Conceptual readymades – a contemporary artist’s use of a classical work selected as a key point of reference taken out of time – have developed in recent years as part of contemporary art’s appropriation of Greco-Roman statuary. This investigation argues that a contemporary artist’s use of the classical does not represent ‘copies’ but cultural readymades. Contemporary digital and sculptural work foregrounding the classical sheds light on the parallel phenomenon whereby Roman re-interpretations of Greek sculpture may have been equivalent to contemporary classicism. Contemporary case studies featuring digital media, generative art, and sculpture are approached both from the perspective of what they can reveal about contemporary art’s use of the classical and what contemporary art’s use of classical sculpture can suggest about Roman reinterpretations as cultural readymades. Remade as part of contemporary art, classical sculpture is uniquely positioned as an accessible point of reference with which to comment on our own time by concurrently reframing the past.

Decapitation and Dynamite: The Mutilated Mountainside Monument of Gaius Julius Aquila on the Coast of Bithynia et Pontus

The Roman monument locally known as Kuşkayası Yol Anıtı (literally bird rock road monument) in Turkish is an arresting site carved in relief on a mountainside. Its decapitated figures have hewn limbs, and dynamite has blasted out large chunks of the monument. Though scholars have tangentially touched upon Kuşkayası, there is little analysis of its visual symbolism and the mutilated human figure’s identity and destruction have been mysteries. This paper will analyse the monument and explicate its noteworthy blend of Roman Imperial and local iconography, a syncretistic design which participates in the Romanization of Bithynia et Pontus and legitimizes the monument’s builder Gaius Julius Aquila. Next, this paper will argue that the mysterious beheaded figure likely represents Aquila rather than Emperor Claudius. Finally, this paper will forward that Kuşkayası was the victim of Christian mutilation in Late Antiquity during its initial phase of destruction, and treasure hunters in its most recent phase. Kuşkayası represents an innovative symbolic composition and speaks both to the syncretistic public art tradition and the history of the destruction of antiquities on the Black Sea coast.

The Classical in Contemporary Art and Visual Culture – an Introduction

This special issue of CLARA titled ‘The Classical in Contemporary Art and Visual Culture’ focuses on the impact of Greco-Roman antiquity on present day art and culture. Over the last few decades, antique statues have been revived again and again, turning up in new guises in contemporary art from all over the globe. In addition to new works based on specific ancient statues, some artists create art that references the past in a more general way. Other artists question the divide between past and present raising the possibility of ‘multi-temporality’, a phenomenon that will be explored in connection with recent exhibitions. Another aspect of the interaction of antiquity and the contemporary world is the association between luxury brands and antique monuments, fashion brands taking on the role of patrons, paying large sums for the restoration of Roman landmarks. By studying various types of exchanges between the classical and the contemporary, the papers aim to throw light on why artists and designers continue to draw inspiration from ancient art; in short, why antiquity continues to fascinate.

CLARA Review: K. F. B. Fletcher & Osman Umurhan (eds), 2020: Classical Antiquity in Heavy Metal Music.

The concepts ‘classical antiquity’ and ‘heavy metal music’ may appear to be worlds apart. Not only are they separated chronologically but each belongs to an entirely different habitus. While the classical is associated with tradition, good taste and harmony, heavy metal is, at least by some, associated with the very opposite: the breaking of tradition, bad taste and disharmony. And yet, as the present book shows, a very large number of heavy metal bands reference antiquity in various ways, including exponents of Thrash Metal, characterised by speed and aggressiveness; Death Metal, characterised by macabre subject matter and growling vocals; Black Metal with related subject matter but less polished style, and other subgenres. Bands from countries ranging from Greece and Italy to Scandinavia incorporate classical quotations in their lyrics or rewrite ancient texts and myths. Some sing in Greek or Latin, others in Italian or English. The titles of songs, such as Hymn to Apollo, Hymn to Zeus, Medusa and so on, further show the classical inspiration.

CLARA Review: Kourou, N & G. Bourgiannis. Ρυθμοί της Κυπριακής Κεραμικής: Σύντομη Επισκόπηση με βάση τη Συλλογή του Αρχαιολογικού Μουσείου του Τμήματος Ιστορίας και Αρχαιολογίας του Εθνικού και Καποδιστριακού Πανεπιστημίου Αθηνών

The material and visual culture of Cyprus in Greece is represented by two important public collections in Athens, the Thanos Zintilis Collection at the Museum of Cycladic Art, and the collection of Cypriot Antiquities at the National Archaeological Museum in Athens. Both are quantitatively and qualitatively hefty and are wonderfully exhibited in displays that seek to convey to laymen and expertsalike the complexity, interconnections and cultural vigour of Cyprus over several millennia.The handy compendium by Nota Kourou and Giorgos Bourogiannis publishes an equally important, but not as easily accessible to a wider public, collection of Cypriote ceramics at the Archaeological Museum of the University of Athens. This is a didactic collection for students of history, art and archaeology in this institution whose curriculum has regularly included subjects on the art and archaeology of Cyprus since the 1980s.

Rape culture in Classical Athens?

Classical Athens had a culture of widespread sexual violence, where different forms of sexual misconduct were embedded in the normative framework. Numerous products of the city’s ‘popular culture’, such as mythology, literature and art, propagated the normalcy of rape. A large body of modern scholarship has correlated this frequency with the particular Athenian historical context during the Cassical period, underlining that ancient Athenians followed different standards and guidelines than we do for the evaluation of sexual behaviour. This article demonstrates that in Classical Athens the repeated representations of rape in literature and art were means to preserve the fundamental principles of the established male order. The power structure of the Classical Athenian polis fostered attitudes that remind us of the modern concept of ‘rape culture’. This concept, developed by feminist scholars to describe modern realities, reveals how societies can use culture to downgrade the moral wrongness of rape. ‘Rape culture’ will be used in this article as a model, or analytical tool, to reinterpret the Classical literary evidence on Athenian attitudes towards sexual assault. I will argue that this model makes better sense of the evidence than the now prevalent relativistic interpretation.

Decolonising and Displaying Ancient Palestine: Baron Plato von Ustinow’s Collection of Antiquities

This paper examines how Plato von Ustinow (1833-1920/21), a Russian aristocrat and German baron, became one of the nineteenth century’s most prolific collectors of antiquities from Israel, Palestine and the surrounding areas. It investigates how Ustinow collected archaeological artefacts and displayed them in an ʽexhibition hallʼ located at his home Hôtel du Parc, in Jaffa (Tel Aviv), from 1878 to 1913. Until recently, Ustinow’s private museum has been interpreted in the light of cultural revitalisation, as well as a sentimental attempt to inspire research and provide educational resources. However, post-colonial studies demonstrate that during the nineteenth- and early twentieth centuries, scholars from Europe and the USA sought ʽproofʼ of past civilisations. Today, collections that were constructed from this kind of cultural material are considered problematic. Many heritage sites and items of global importance were destroyed, disturbed, pillaged, traded and included in public and private collections without contextual information. The present text takes a deep dive into the history and formation of the Ustinow collection, now in the Museum of Cultural Heritage in Oslo, seeking to recover (to the extent possible) the wealth of empirical evidence which can further elucidate archaeological material from the Near East.

Considerations on the Function and Provenance of the Glass in the Plato von Ustinow Collection

The Russian émigré Plato von Ustinow – who settled in Palestine in 1862 and lived there until 1913 – was a keen collector of antiquities. In contrast to other collectors, however, von Ustinow did not purchase the objects from art-dealers. Instead, he appears to have worked with professional archaeologists, but also bought objects from local inhabitants in Jaffa and Jerusalem. His collection includes a substantial number of glass vessels: primarily blown vessels dating to the first- to sixth- or seventh century CE, i.e. the Roman and Early Byzantine era. The von Ustinow collection is comparatively homogeneous, and most of the objects are likely to stem from a relatively limited geographical area, as it closely resembles material from funerary contexts found in modern-day Israel. The collection includes a number of perfume bottles, small jars and kohl-flasks, objects most probably utilised in the preparation of the deceased before burial.

Chromatic Variation in Late Antique Rainbows

Depictions of rainbows in late antique and early Byzantine art follow the normal sequence of the spectral colours, only some bows exclude blue and violet. Another characteristic feature of the late antique rainbow is the inclusion of white and the non-spectral hue pink. In order to investigate chromatic characteristics, I use as case studies the comparatively few extant rainbow images of third- to sixth-century date from Thessaloniki, Constantinople, Rome and Ravenna. The rainbows, depicted in a floor mosaic, three illuminated manuscripts and three monumental wall mosaic decorations, are either part of narratives or rainbow-patterned borders used to frame other scenes. To throw light on the chromatic variations, ancient descriptions of rainbows are brought into the discussion and the representations are seen in relation to meteorological research. I propose that the late antique rainbow images follow two visual traditions, both of which can be traced back to the Hellenistic period and both of which are grounded in scientific research. One is the sunrise/sunset rainbow that ranges from red to green. I argue that the exclusion of blue/violet may be due to its being more difficult to see against the sky, the wavelength of violet being closest to the boundary beyond which coloured light tends to look black. The variant type, found especially in the church mosaics, covers the whole spectrum from red via green to violet as well as pink and white. I suggest that the non-spectral pink hues can be understood as the gradations of red that can sometimes be observed in the natural bow and that the white band provides highlight, which combined with a silver line indicates a strong luminance.

The Scarab and Scaraboid Seals in the Egyptian Collection of the Museum of Cultural History, University of Oslo

The Museum of Cultural History in Oslo is home to a small but fine ancient Egyptian collection. For my Magister thesis at the University of Heidelberg, I had the pleasure of conducting research on the 98 scarabs and scaraboid seals in the collection. The study focused on the bottom motifs and the multifunctional purposes for their owners as well as the important insights they provide into common religious beliefs in ancient Egyptian society. This short overview of the research conducted in Oslo presents all twelve attested bottom motifs and introduces the most remarkable objects in the collection. Covering a time span from the Twelfth Dynasty until the Late Period and most probably the Roman Period, the scarabs and scaraboid seals in the museum bear testimony to 2000 years of cultural history, providing fascinating details about the religious beliefs of the common people as well as demonstrating the importance of these objects in everyday life.