Classical Art

Accompanies an exhibition at the State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, from September 23, 2011- January 15, 2012

This book is made up of nine classical sculptures from the Hermitage Museum, removed from their plinths and repositioned to share a raised floor with the viewer; and seventeen highly abstracted body-forms by Antony Gormley. The idea is to juxtapose ancient, idealized statues with Gormley's more disinterested sculptures and see whether, in Gormley's work, the abstract language of Euclidean geometry can make a shelter for feeling, and whether, in the case of the classical works, demounting and putting the viewer on the same level as their original makers can re-establish them as made things. The interaction of the public, captured in documentary photographs, is key to a project that aims to show how classical marbles, Gormley's own sculptures and the living human visitors inhabit the same space and can converse with each other.

The interest surrounding 19th century Catalan sculpture is
undergoing something of a revival and re-reading that is
as necessary as it is fascinating. In 19th century European
sculpture the figure of the Hero became a key reference,
a motif that artists frequently referred to and that was
appreciated for its strength as well as its malleability and
versatility. This was a character capable of representing
universal and timeless values and, as such, has a relevance
that remains almost untouched today. The Hero, presented
via different characters and in various actions, taking various
styles and trends into account, both exemplifies and explains
18th century Catalan sculpture, especially insofar as the first
half of the century is concerned.
The publication you are holding is based on a study of 19th
century Catalan sculpture, and in particular its relationship
with the iconographic motif of the Hero, which was
undertaken within the The Other 19th Century funded project
(HAR2010-16328) by the GRACMON Research Group from
the University of Barcelona’s Art History Department. The
project looks to out interest in the work of Fine Art academies
in the contemporary period as education and training centres
which formed artistic taste. The project also seeks to join the
new historiographic revisions of 19th century Catalan art
and to contribute to the re-reading of the academies and
academia undertaken several years ago.
To improve the synergy and increase the project’s range we
have considered The Image of the Hero in Catalan Sculpture
(1800-1850) as an idea framework for the II International
Conference on the Modernity of the Classic, which will take
place in Barcelona on the 30th and 31st of May 2013. The
inauguration of the exhibition will coincide with the start of
Conference, to which it is closely linked both in terms of its
thematic vocation as well as its range and focus.
The essay that forms the basis for this work, ‘The Image of
the Hero in Catalan Sculpture (1800-1850)’, which you will
find in these pages, is also the name of the exhibition that
explains the results thereof; an exhibition that will take place
simultaneously in the Sant Jordi Royal Catalan Academy of
Fine Arts Museum, the National Art Museum of Catalonia,
the Frederic Marès Museum in Barcelona and the Víctor
Balaguer Library-Museum in Vilanova i la Geltrú. The main
object of the exhibition is to analyse the iconogragic model
of the Hero in Catalan academic sculpture at the beginning
of the 19th century. The exhibition’s focus is on this model
and its relationship to the Classical ideal, whilst trying to
establish the way in which this ideal is received, adapted
and transmitted in the production of sculptors active in the
period mentioned, such as Damià Campeny, Antoni Solà,
Josep Bover i Mas, Manuel Vilar and Adrià Ferran. The
project’s basis also allows for another train of throught which
questions the profession of the sculpture at the beginning
of the 19th century, which suggests the topos of the sculptor
himself as a Hero. Moreover, the project seeks to look beyond
the approaches to the iconographic motif of the Hero in the
sculpture of the period to juxtapose them with the vision of
contemporary artists. These artists revise the image of the
19th-century hero and recreate it through drawings all the
while attempting to fill the void between our time and theirs
and adding new readings and meaning to this material.
Various specialists from the worlds of 19th century art and the
relationships between contemporary and classical culture
and art have contributed towards this book. Ian Jenkins
explores the importance of the representation of the body in
art in Ancient Greece, in addition to its social uses; a context
which becomes one of the starting points for academicism
in the Neoclassical period. Focussing on the reading of the
reception of the classical in the 19th century, Carlos Reyero
reflects on the heroic nude and analyses the consolidation
of this motif in the field of sculpture and taking into account
its symbolic use: the meanings that the sculpture could carry
and its historical evolution. The inherent ambivalence of
the iconography of the Hero is studied by Tomas Macsotay
in his essay which shows how the Académie Royale de Paris
was on of the most important centres in spreading European
academic ideas in the 18th century. The 19th century’s interest
in the Classical carries on well into the 20th, and becomes clear
in the figurative trends of the avant-guard and inter-war
classicism. This phenomenon, termed ‘Neo-neoclassicim’ is examined by Patrick Bade. All the texts are printed in both
English and Catalan versions.
The second part of this publication is dedicated to illustrating
all these reflections visually. Here we present the selection of
sculptures that gave rise to the project, accompanied by brief
studies that analyse and contextualise them. This is also the
place where the work of various new artists is shown, all
of whom related to the University of Barcelona’s Fine Art
Faculty, who put themselves in the place of artists from 200
years ago and have executed ‘academies’, drawings using
the ancient model: drawing having always been one of the
strong points of the acadamies. Unfortunately the Academy
of Barcelona’s drawing archive disappeared during the
historical process of the institution’s modernisation. This
lack has promoted the creation of these new ‘academies’, a
project undertaken by Professors Bibiana Crespo and Roser
Masip, part of the University of Barcelona’s Department
of Drawing, who have also collaborated in the publication
with individual reflections on the process of drawing the the
academies.
Finally, the book presents a collection of plaster anatomical
fragments belonging to the academic and sculpture Frederic
Marès, today kept at the museum bearing his name. These
very likely came from the Barcelona Fine Art School and
allow us to better understand the use of casts and moulds of
antique and natural works that were used in the traditional
apprenticeship. Together with these fragments, the catalogue
includes academia drawings from the end of the 18th century
and the beginning of the 19th century from the National Art
Museum of Catalonia which enrich the reflection around the
methodologies and systems of representations of the body in
Catalan art of the period studied.

Notice:
Chronicle of Higher Education Oct. 17, 2008.

Reviews:
Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2009.07.59 [J. Jacobs]; Journal of Roman Archaeology 23 (2010) 583–86 [S. Dillon]; Journal of Roman Studies 101 (2011) 255–57 [C. Damon]; Classical Review 63.1 (2013) 249–52 [J. Connolly].