First impressions of Pompeii

In my research of the early excavations in Pompeii, I found a book by ingrid D. Rowland entitled "From Pompeii" published in 2014.  In it Rowland describes 19th century visits of several famous people to Naples and the newly rediscovered cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum including Mozart, Charles Dickens, Mark Twain and others.  I was particularly struck by her discussion of author and revolutionary  Madame de Staël and how she incorporated her impressions of Pompeii into one of her novels.

Anne Louise Germaine de Staël-Holstein, commonly known as Madame de Staël, was a woman of letters and political theorist of Genevan origin who in her lifetime witnessed at first-hand the French Revolution and the Napoleonic era up to the French Restoration.  Madame de Staël visited Pompeii on a "Grand Tour" in 1803.  While there, she witnessed a very active Vesuvius as well.  In 1807, she penned a novel entitled "Corinne" where she provides what amounts to an eye-witness account of a lesser eruption of Vesuvius:

"The torrent is a funereal color; when it burns the vines or the trees, however, you can see a clear bright flame coming from it. It flows slowly like black sand by day and red by night. When it comes near you can hear a little noise of sparks, all the more frightening because it is slight, and cunning seems to combine with strength. Thus the royal tiger arrives secretly with measured tread. . . . Its glare is so fiery that for the first time the earth is reflected in the sky, giving it the appearance of continual lightning; in turn the sky is repeated in the sea and nature is set ablaze by this triple image of fire."

Madame de Staël also describes a poignant impression of seeing the remains of the ancient city through the eyes of her protagonist:

"When you stand at the centre of the crossroads, on every side you can see almost in its entirety the still surviving part of the town; it is as if you were waiting for someone, as if the master is about to arrive, and the very semblance of life in this place makes you even more sad at feeling its eternal silence. It is with pieces of petrified lava that most of these houses have been built, and they have been buried beneath other pieces of lava. So there are ruins upon ruins and tombs upon tombs. This history of the world where periods are counted from ruin to ruin, this human life whose trail is followed by the gleam of the volcanic eruptions that have consumed it, fills the heart with profound melancholy. What a long time men have existed! What a long time they have lived, suffered, and perished! Where can their feelings and thoughts be found again? Is the air you breathe amongst these ruins still marked with their traces or are they forever deposited in heaven where immortality reigns? A few burnt manuscripts found at Herculaneum and Pompeii, which people at Portici are trying to unroll, are all that is left to enable us to learn about the unfortunate victims consumed by earth’s thunderbolt, the volcano. But as you pass by those ashes which art manages to bring back to life, you are afraid to breathe, in case a breath carries away the dust perhaps still imprinted with noble ideas."

I experienced the same bitter-sweetness when I visited Pompeii for the first time.

Image: A portrait of Madame de Staël by Marie Éléonore Godefroid after François Pascal Simon Gérard, sometime between 1818-1849, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

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Getty to feature modern depictions of Pompeii catastrophe

Unlike many other exhibitions of archaeological material from Pompeii, The Getty Villa's new presentation,  The Last Days of Pompeii: Decadence, Apocalypse, Resurrection, scheduled to open September 12, 2012 and running until January 7, 2013, begins with modern representations of perceived Pompeian decadence.  

The prevailing idea that the cataclysmic eruption that destroyed the Vesuvian cities in A.D. 79 was a justly deserved punishment for sins has pervaded popular consciousness through art and literature up to the present day. This notion has inspired artists and provided a vehicle to present sensual scenes or subversive themes in an acceptable setting.  A highlight of this section is Francesco Netti’s most famous work, Gladiator Fight during a Meal at Pompeii (1880, Naples, Museo di Capodimonte), which depicts the aftermath of a mortal combat held at a Pompeian banquet for the entertainment of dissolute, drunken Romans, while ladies swoon after the victor.

Gladiator Fight at a Meal in Pompeii by Francesco Netti (1880)

But despite its seeming accuracy, achieved through the precise depiction of archaeological artifacts, this scene has little basis in ancient practice. Roman gladiators generally performed in public arenas and rarely fought to the death.  The painting, rather, can be viewed as a contemporary critique of mid-nineteenth-century Italian aristocrats. 

Also on display are photographs by Wilhelm von Gloeden and Gugliemo Plüschow, some from Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema’s personal archive, which record some of the best-known monuments at Pompeii populated by local youths staged in various states of undress. These photographs perpetuate a long-standing notion that Pompeii was a place of desire and erotic indulgence.

The second section examines the well-known apocalyptic event. Pompeii’s catastrophic demise has become the archetype for all subsequent disasters, whether natural or man-made. While eighteenth- and nineteenth-century artists often celebrated the terrifying yet beautiful power of nature, more recent artists have used the event to explore such issues as the aftermath of World War II and the angst of the Atomic Age.

 Image courtesy of the Art Institute of Chicago

Flight From Pompeii by Giovanni
Maria Benzoni, Italian,  1873.
Image courtesy of the Art Institute of Chicago.

Sebastian William Thomas Pether’s Eruption of Vesuvius with Destruction of a Roman City (1824, Boston, Museum of Fine Arts) dramatically shows the volcano spewing lava onto the ancient city, but his depiction of Roman architecture and figures in early-nineteenth century dress cross temporal boundaries. Also, embedded in the gilt frame are pieces of what appears to be lava, but is actually trimmed wood burl. Thus, what was intended to add authenticity to the imaginary scene is itself false. Alternatively, Andy Warhol’s Mount Vesuvius (1985, Pittsburg, Warhol Museum), with its vibrant palette and cartoonish effects, demonstrates that serial reproductions and kitsch are not just hallmarks of Pop Art, but also relate to the proliferation of images of the famous volcano. 

The exhibition also explores the famous body casts of Vesuvius’s victims. Since the invention of the plaster casting technique in 1863, body casts of victims have captured the imagination of the public through photographs of such artists as Giorgio Sommer, whose image on view of the famous cast of a dog found in the House of Vesonius Primus at Pompeii has served as an iconic representation of the suffering of the victims.

Cast of an unfortunate animal victim of

the 79 CE Vesuvius eruption.  

Photographed at Boscoreale, Italy by

Mary Harrsch.

Widely reproduced, it has been featured in numerous modern and contemporary works of art including Robert Rauschenberg’s Small Rebus (1956, Los Angeles, Museum of Contemporary Art) and Allan McCollum’s sculpture The Dog from Pompeii (1991, New York, Artist/Friedrich Petzel Gallery), which appear in the exhibition. The body casts on display in the exhibition are modern works, made from the now lost voids of disappeared bodies. Although we react to them emotionally, they are far removed from Vesuvius’s ancient victims. 

Another myth about Pompeii is its state of preservation. Few people realize that during World War II, the archaeological site was badly damaged by bombing carried out by American and British fighters seeking to disrupt German resupply routes nearby. After the war, many of the damaged structures were quickly rebuilt. Included in the exhibition are items from the Getty Research Institute’s special collections, which record the destruction caused by the bombing and detail the locations of the strikes. 

The exhibition concludes with an examination of archaeological fantasy and the attempts of artists to resurrect the ancient city. For over three hundred years, buildings and artifacts excavated at Vesuvian sites have advanced scientific reconstructions of daily life in the classical world. 

Reproduction of a bronze Faun found in the

House of the Faun in Pompeii.  Photographed

by Mary Harrsch at the Pompeii Archaeological

Park near Naples, Italy.

Simultaneously, they have underpinned more fanciful reincarnations, as artists have superimposed their contemporary values and ideas on antiquity with a variety of motivations, from the light-hearted to the serious. 

Inspired by a famous ancient figure of a dancing faun found in Pompeii, Hippolyte Alexandre Julien Moulin’s large bronze, A Lucky Find at Pompeii (1863, Paris, Musée d’Orsay), playfully depicts a nude Neapolitan youth rejoicing in the discovery of a fragmentary statuette of the hero Hercules, which he holds up in his right hand. The boy’s pleasure at his Pompeian find embodies the nineteenth-century European enthusiasm for both the artworks newly unearthed at Vesuvian sites and the process of their recovery, however idealized. The sculpture was much celebrated, winning a medal at the Paris Salon of 1864.

(Foreground) A Lucky Find in Pompeii by

Hippolyte Alexandre Julien Moulin, French
1863.  Photographed at the Musée d'Orsay by Mary Harrsch.

 From the Vatican Museums comes an extraordinary loan of a cabinet containing objects excavated at Pompeii during the 1849 site visit by Pope Pius IX. There is much doubt about the extent to which these excavations were staged and whether artifacts were planted, since the objects found are strikingly diverse in type and material, including items of marble, glass, bronze, terracotta, local stone and lava, perhaps chosen in advance to emphasize the quality and variety of finds.

I sincerely hope I can make it down to the Getty Villa during this important exhibition.

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