Looking at Roman-Era Sculpture: Portraits in Marble

After looking at lots and lots of marble statuary, I can say with confidence that marble doesn’t last as well as bronze. 

Torso at American Academy in Rome

It chips, breaks, discolors, collects accretions, erodes. Parts get lost. Applied paint fades and washes off. Prudes knock off the penises, conquerors knock off the heads. Medieval workmen needing lime for concrete melted a lot of marble statuary, mainly arms and legs which were easier than torsos. There’s even a 20^th century story of WWII American soldiers stationed in Piazza Navona breaking fingers off the statues for souvenirs of Rome.

Thus much work is needed. We never see the marble quite as it was. Even after the fingers are re-carved and glued onto the marble hands, the line of the mend remains, the color is a little different.

Mended head, Rome National Museum

This has to be all right. Monochrome statuary is beautiful and does great things with shadows. Broken and eroded and discolored statues and architectural details show us the transience of all things, including ourselves. We see how all things pass away. It’s a strong reality hit.

Basin of marble fountain near the Forum

Sacrificial bull, marble, Forum

I want to start from my aesthetic focus. What do I want from the Roman Empire? Do I admire the Romans? Not entirely – despite their many virtues of administration and engineering, Rome was a predatory power, based on plunder and the labor of slaves. They did a lot of good, for instance by enforcing the pax romana. For hundreds of years citizens could get a grip on their own lives and be confident of a stable political system. Still, there was a scary side to their approach that can’t be overcome. They didn't hesitate to kill if other methods of conquest (trade, political maneuvering) didn't work.

Tomb carving celebrating success in war

Rome National Museum

So, about the art? They got a lot of their art from Greece. Romans actually were much better at road-building and urban planning than at art. All those garden statues and images of gods – “Roman copy of Greek original” is a very common description. They imported Greek sculptors, too.

But, that’s not the end of the story. They made a fabulous and important contribution to world art in revising what constituted a portrait. Portraiture provides the main artistic innovation made by Romans. 

Clearly, Romans were realists. Greek sculpture tended toward the ideal, all those beautiful athletes and goddesses in their perfection. All very well, but not what the Romans wanted in a portrait.

This and all following portraits are from

the Rome National Museum

Hundreds, probably thousands of Roman portrait sculptures survive. In the Rome National Museum, a panel explains that ancestors were included in the household shrines. Family was an all-important value in Roman social life. Householders wanted to know what those ancestors looked like – they didn’t want approximate ancestors. They wanted their predecessors’ statues to look like they looked in life.

Evidently, they do. 

Two of three survive on this funerary monument

They are carved from marble, formerly painted, now white in the main. They can be dated from the hair styles, which followed the leaders. There are no compromises as regards wrinkles and attitude. They do not flatter. 

Generally, the faces are marked by experience. When you see anxiety, calculation, pride, disappointment, you see the sculptor catching a real person. A room of portrait sculptures looks like a party where everyone is temporarily frozen in ice.

Caligula, not someone you want to meet at a party.

I love Roman portraiture! How candid, how honest, how accurate. These are definitely to admire in their art. 

by Nancy