Tutorial 1: Pliny, Art & Empire

Takeaways from Pliny’s writing & style (6)

1. Pliny’s Natural History as a persuasive piece of rhetoric

• NOT a neutral collection of facts

• Political impetus: underlying concern w/ social hierarchy

  • Luxury’s ability to create new divisions through new symbols to define social dominance

  • Pliny uses science to legitimate the absolute validity of a traditional Roman social ethic rooted in Nature

2. The idea of a canon of art & artists

• E.g. for each artistic medium, provides biographies of select eminent artists; lists artists of lower importance

• E.g. mentions eminent works of art: the Laocoön (‘a work superior to any painting and any bronze’)

3. Concepts of the artist

• E.g. artistic genius

• E.g. the ‘mad’, perfectionist & self-critical artist

  • E.g. Apollodorus who was a ‘severe critic of his own work’, ‘often broke his statues in pieces after he had finished them’, was given the surname of the ‘Madman’

4. The elevation of Greek art & artists to a heroic status

• Constantly refers to & praises the works of ancient Greece

• Ancient art as timeless, idealised, & aesthetic

5. Conversely, a challenge to/criticism of present-day art

• Ancient artworks as perfect models that the present couldn’t possibly hope to emulate

6. Origin of a biological model of artistic development

• Cyclical scheme

• Birth —> growth —> maturity —> decay/death

• E.g. bronze: works of the ancients were superior, BUT craftsmanship has diminished in Pliny’s time

Pliny’s ideas (6)

1. Nature as divine & deserving of human veneration

• ‘sacred parent’

• Nature’s creations are designed purely to benefit mankind

  • Anything harmful = unnatural, vice versa

  • Humans must look to her works w/ wonder & gratitude

2. Humans vs. Nature

• The natural world stands in contrast to & in r/s with the human world

  • The history of Nature = a history of Culture

  • The natural history of the Earth = the unnatural history of Man

3. Human abuse of Nature

• Man, blinded by luxuria, abuses nature & turns it into the tool of his own destruction

• Luxuria as a failure to live according to the natural order

  • Stands in competition w/ Nature by trying to outdo its breathtaking variety

  • E.g. gems, ores, purple dyes, pearls & oysters: exposing what Nature has carefully hidden away

4. Natural forces ultimately indicated the true value of a work of art

• Nature punishes humankind for its crimes against the natural order

• Amoral/superfluous art = destruction

  • E.g. Emperor Nero ordered the painting of a portrait of himself on a colossal scale, but it was ‘struck by lightning and destroyed by fire’

• Virtuous/valuable art = able to withstand the natural elements

  • E.g. Parrhasius’s painting of Meleager, Heracles & Perseus was struck by lightning 3 times ‘without being effaced’, a circumstance which in itself enhances the wonder felt for it’

5. The most valued art was the kind that most closely mimicked Nature

• Mimesis

• Renders the artist capable of manipulating Nature & humankind

  • E.g. competition of artistic skill between Parrhasius & Zeuxis: Zeuxis ‘produced a picture of grapes so successfully represented that birds flew up to the stage buildings’, vs. Parrhasius ‘produced such a realistic picture of a curtain that Zeuxis requested that the curtain should now be drawn and the picture displayed’ = Parrhasius won

6. Yet, mankind’s creative powers would never fully supplant those of Nature

• E.g. the eminent painter Protogenes creating a painting called Ialysus: a dog deemed unsatisfactory by the artist because the foam around its mouth appeared unnatural

  • Wanted his picture to contain ‘the truth and not merely a near-truth’

  • Reworked his painting repeatedly to no avail & fell into a rage, dashing a sponge against the area

  • Serendipitously achieved the desired image: ‘chance produced the effect of Nature’

Key issues (4)

1. Pliny’s book as a template for all future histories of Art

2. What is the relationship between Art & the Natural world in Pliny’s text?

   (1) The most valued art was one that most closely mimicked Nature

   (2) Yet, mankind’s creative powers would never fully supplant those of Nature

   (3) Natural forces ultimately indicated the true value of a work of art

3. How is Greece distinguished from Rome in Pliny’s text?

4. What is more important to Pliny the Elder, artists or art objects?

Legacies left by Pliny’s writings about Art (3)

1. The elevation of earlier art & artists to a heroic status

• Ancient art as timeless, idealised, & aesthetic

2. Conversely, a challenge to/criticism of present-day Art

• Ancient artworks as perfect models that the present couldn’t possibly hope to emulate

3. Origin of a biological model of artistic development

• Cyclical scheme: birth —> growth —> maturity —> decay —> death