Classics in Contemporary Culture

What Would Pericles Spray-Paint?

An article celebrating the 25th anniversary edition of Subway Art, by Martha Cooper and Henry Chalfan, constructs an analogy, which I believe works as follows--Western Democracy is to the Age of Pericles as 21st Century Graffiti Artists are to the Age of Ed Koch.  Hmm...Is that meaningful?

Those who identify themselves as Western look at the ancient Athenians as a smaller, earlier version of themselves. Greeks in the Age of Pericles had the idea of democracy, the idea of the individual, the idea of reason and its importance. Something similar is at work when a hiphop head of the '00s looks at these photos of graffiti artists on the streets, apartments, and subway tracks of New York. We see ourselves in these people who had an idea of postmodern urbanism, an idea of the power of appropriating pop culture, an idea of what David Harvey calls "the right to the city." These citizens of the Age of Mayor Koch are us in our infancy.

Department of Corrections

The paper of record needs to stick a post-it in one of its travel resources; actually, defacing the book with a hand-written note would seem to be justified.  Here's Iva Skoch:

One of my favorite corrections sections is in the Travel section of The New York Times. I bet nobody else reads it ,although it can be quite entertaining. This is my favorite correction of this week: "An article on April 20 about Rome at night misidentified the figure from mythology represented in the centerpiece sculpture of the Trevi Fountain. It is Oceanus, the Titan who the ancient Greeks believed ruled the watery elements - not Neptune, the Roman god of the sea."

That wouldn't be so bad, but this is what they included as an excuse: "The error has appeared for years in travel guides about Rome, is found extensively in Internet references, and has infiltrated at least five other articles in The Times since 1981."

Great. Some slacker once put a false piece of information in a guidebook and it's been picked up repeatedly in the last 27 years. You would think that the NY Times wouldn't rely on guidebooks for their fact-checking.

Only don't click on that Wikipedia link, because the entry identifies the figure as Neptune!

What does it matter, anyway?  Well...Neptune is just one of those Johnny-come-lately Olympians, whereas Oceanus is the more primordial and more philosophically amenable being...or so Nicola Salvi (the original designer of the Trevi Fountain) saw it.  In his explanation, which I'm getting from The Art Bulletin 38 (1956), 169-71, he says:

Oceanus, whose statue will be placed on the Fountain of Trevi should certainly be considered as belonging to the same series as the other ancient deities who, under the cloak of mysterious imagery, have always symbolized useful lessons in moral philosophy or have contained hidden explanations of natural phenomena. This god, according to those authors who have had occasion to speak of him, has never been the subject of fanciful legends, but has always been referred to in terms which denote a Power as superior to other Powers, as a universal Cause is superior to particular Causes. This clearly shows us that he was thought of by ancient philosophers as one of those prime, most powerful agents among natural phenomena, and was one of the original sources of an infinite number of products which depended on him.

In more specific terms he may be described thus. Oceanus has been represented at times as a figure traversing the seas on a chariot drawn by dolphins, preceded by Tritons, and followed by a numerous train of sea Nymphs. This image signifies that the visible and immense body of ocean waters are held together and constrained in the broad bosom of the Earth, and this water when it is in its assigned place we call the Sea. This Sea is, so to speak, the perpetual source which has the power to diffuse various parts of itself, symbolized by the Tritons and the sea Nymphs, who go forth to give necessary sustenance to living matter for the productivity and conservation of new forms of life, and this we can see. But after this function has been served, these parts return in a perpetual cycle to take on new spirit and a new strength from the whole, that is to say from the sea itself.

At other times Oceanus has been called the father of all things, and was believed to be the son of the Sky and of the Earth; in this role he is not the symbol of the powerful operative forces of water gathered together in the sea so much as the actual working manifestation of these powers, which appear as moisture; in this form water permeates all material things, and winding through the veins of Earth, even into the most minute recesses, reveals itself as the everlasting source of that infinite production which we see in Nature, which water also is capable of perpetuating in its productivity by its untiring ministrations.

Thus, in whatever way we choose to visualize Oceanus, it will always be true that the image must embody an impression of power which has no limit, and is not restricted in the material world by any bounds. It is completely free and always at work in even the smallest parts of the created Universe. Here it is brought and distributes itself to make useful those parts of Earth which give nutrition and birth to new forms. At the same time it quenches the excessive heat which would destroy this life. Thus water can be called the only everlasting source of continuous being.

[...and he goes on for a page or two after that, with the specifics...]

Aristotle's Bustin' Out All Over

A new image of Aristotle has been placed in Athens Square Park in Astoria--the New York Times reports:

The bust, sculptured by a Greek artist, George V. Tsaras, is a gift to the city from the people of Halkidiki, a peninsula in the Macedonia region of Greece (not be confused with the independent, neighboring nation of Macedonia).  Since the 1980s, Athens Square Inc., a private group, has been adding ornamental statues and adding a meeting place designed to look like a Greek amphitheater. The park — which was acquired by the Board of Education in 1963 for use as a school playground and was then converted in 1990 to a neighborhood gathering place — already includes three granite Doric columns and statues of Socrates and the goddess Athena.

Adrian Benepe, the city’s parks commissioner, waxed a bit, er, philosophical as he unveiled the bust. “In the spirit of Aristotle’s words, ‘The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance,’ this sculpture is a little piece of Greece to our parks,” he said.

Prometheus Bound - with Gags!

...in which Prometheus' compulsory situation becomes a sit-com - in cartoon form.  Go see Mark Weinstein's The Miserable World of Prometheus!!

[Thanks to RogueClassicism, where some "episodes" will also appear...]

Separation of Myth and State

Ron Clark painted a mural of Prometheus bringing fire to humans at Coal Ridge High School (Glenwood Springs, CO)...but there were complaints.  No calls for changing the school's team name from the Titans to something less pagan, however.  Here's an excerpt from the Post Independent article on the controversy, which also includes a picture of the (now covered) mural:

Vague ideas
Clark admitted taking artistic liberties on the Prometheus painting. He claimed to have made several attempts to communicate with the faculty and staff what he had in mind for the mural with no response. Adding that no one from the school had a solid idea of what they wanted, just vague ideas that included a flame and the beliefs of the school.

The original idea, according to Moeller, was for Clark do three pieces for the school. One in the gymnasium of a lightning bolt incorporating the word Titans into it; a flame with the schools’ motto in a common area; and a mural in the common area. Clark did all three pieces in a two-week period in early July. However, Clark stated that he never had direct contact from anyone at the school and that Information regarding the mural was transferred through Clark’s sister, Carrie Lyons, who communicated with Moeller.

“I talked to the principal (Humble) over the phone while she was on vacation about the mural,” Clark said. “She told me just to paint it and that she would see it when she got back.”

According to Humble, the painting was already done by the time she talked to Clark about it.

A religious debate
A photo of the Clark working on the project appeared in the July 10 issue of the Post Independent sparking a number of letters to the editor.

School officials declared that the decision to cover the painting had nothing to do with a letter to the editor written by Keith Wood — Pastor of the Glenwood Springs Apostolic Church — published in the Aug. 1 edition of the paper. In the letter, Wood compared the painting to the crucifixion of Jesus. By that time, Humble had already made the decision to cover it up.

“When I saw the picture (of the mural) in the paper I was just amazed,” Wood said. “I felt that it was my responsibility to stand up for what I believed in. The devil works his way into all sorts of places. People who know their god know that they need to be his voice in situations like this.”

“Where was this debate when the Glenwood Springs High School decided to call themselves the Demons?” asked Clark. “You can’t just make up a definition of what you want the Titans to be: like a lightning bolt. It just doesn’t work like that. If we are going to allow the students to choose a mascot and then tell them what to believe about the mascot, it just doesn’t make sense.”

Wood said that he thought Titans is a more suitable mascot name than the Demons of Glenwood Springs High School.

Clark expressed concern of allowing a school to represent themselves as the Titans but not being able to have one painted on the wall. Adding that covering up the painting without any debate was a hasty decision.

Oedipus Tex?

At the Aspen Art Museum, there is an exhibition (until Oct. 1) of work (especially dealing with the subject of psychiatry) by Venezuelan Javier Tellez--announced in Artdaily.com; the notice also mentions a classical angle...

As the first Distinguished Artist in Residence, Téllez collaborated with members of the Oasis Club House, a psychiatric facility in Grand Junction, to create a western film based on Sophocles’ Oedipus Rex. The film will be screened in the museum’s Upper Gallery, which Téllez used as a film production studio during the course of his residency.

The film is apparently (according to the caption of the still image) called Oedipus Marshal...Apologies will be issued, I'm sure, to P. D. Q. Bach...

Horace: Time-Traveller?

A San Diego exhibition pairing visual and literary art gets reviewed in the Union-Tribune, but I just need to quote it for the gaffe...

Horace usually gets the credit. In about 20 B.C., he coined the famous phrase ut pictura poesis: “as is painting so is poetry.” Actually, like a lot of Roman thinkers, he may have been borrowing from an earlier Greek source – in particular, Plutarch – but whatever the case, commentators have been insisting on a special relationship between painting and poetry ever since.

This rich history exists as a big backdrop for a modest, nationally touring exhibition now on view at the Centro Cultural de la Raza, “Poetas y Pintores: Artists Conversing With Verse.”

Must be the editor's fault...[cf. this on the phrase ut pictura poesis]...if so, I also take issue with the editor's judgment in not balking at the word "exists."

 

Latin Will Get You Fired!

In an obituary/article in the San Francisco Chronicle on architecture critic Allan Temko, there's a little classical angle:

After the war, he finished his studies at Columbia and then headed west. There was an extremely brief stint at The Chronicle in 1949 - it supposedly ended when the cub reporter was found at his desk in the newsroom reading Catullus in the original Latin. Next came graduate studies at UC Berkeley, where Temko met Elizabeth (Becky) Ostroff. They married in 1950, a union that would last until her death in 1996.

Spafford's Iliad

At a Seattle art gallery, showing through the end of the month:  Michael Spafford's "Iliad Series" of woodblock prints--and some oil paintings and drawings.  Here's a description of one:

...Zeus brooding over a black, blank world. Zeus is an engaged god, awash in desire. The world is blank to him because there are no battles in it. His eyes are dark holes cast downward into a larger dark. Halfway through the past century, when religion appeared to be fading from human affairs and even theologians debated the prospect of God's death, Wallace Stevens, in "Sunday Morning," mocked the idea of needing gods in the first place: "Jove in the clouds had his inhuman birth./ No mother suckled him, no sweet land gave/ Large mannered-motions to his mythy mind."
...
[Spafford] drew Zeus in profile, whispering the battle dream in Agamemnon's ear. Zeus' lacy beard turns up again as smoke from a funeral pyre. In the final frame, the god again broods in heaven, looking down on the dead, their bent knees raised toward the downward vertical projection of his face.

Between the first and last frames are ritualized yet raw forms of combat, reduced to a streamlined, formal essence, each its own kind of common tragedy. Sword, tongue and phallus serve terrible ends. Black cuts into white space and shadow imposes itself on light. The forms are silhouettes, a strategy Spafford employed decades before Kara Walker. His are nearly all anonymous, swimming in a tide larger than themselves, trapped in their assigned parts.

Spafford does not illustrate the text. He replaces it with a pictographic code that is both prehistoric and completely new.

And if you don't happen to be in Seattle this month, see these pictures on the gallery's website.

 

Classics in Contemporary Comics

Hmm...is this the way to make Greco-Roman stuff more accessible???

• A Japanese comic-book reworking of the Trojan War story, entitled "Ilios"  (text has been translated into English) [Thanks to the website Troy Stories Today]
• A parody of a Jack Chick religious tract, with the Olympians substituting for the Christian Trinity... [Thanks to AJ]