Temples for the Gods

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exhibition Details

Many of the people clambering over the ruins of ancient Rome in the 17th and 18th centuries were merely curious about the secret city half-hidden beneath their feet. Connoisseurs, however, were acutely aware of the ruins' original function – as temples for gods and goddesses, and monuments for famous Romans.

Collectors avidly sought out original sculptures, sarcophagi and fragments of buildings from the Renaissance onwards, and in later centuries there was a thriving market for copies of major works. The discovery of the ruined townships of Pompeii and Herculaneum, near Naples, caused a widespread classical revival throughout Europe, known as Neoclassicism.

Translations and reprints of early texts whetted the appetite of connoisseurs. The names of Greek and Roman gods, as well as the heroes of mythology, became familiar to many, their symbolic meanings adapted to illustrate the ideals of the times.

This second part of Temples for the Gods draws on works from our collections which illustrate this ongoing fascination with the past. The curious 18th century onlookers populating them are joined by the heroic figures who were commemorated or worshipped in these buildings long ago.

Date
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Curated by
Mary Kisler
Location
Level 1
Cost
Free entry

Related Artworks

Tempio antico inventato e disegnato alla maniera di quelli che si fabbricavano in onore della Dea Vesta: quindi vedesi in nmezzo la grand' Ara, sopra della quale conservavasi dalle Vergini Vestali l'inestinguibile fuoco sacro .... (Imaginary ancient temple designed in the style of those built in honour of the Goddess Vesta: in the centre is the great altar on which the Vestal Virgins preserved the inextinguishable sacred fire ...)
Giovanni Battista Piranesi

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Mackelvie Trust Collection, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, bequest of Dr Walter Auburn, 1982

Giovanni Battista Piranesi
Veduta del sotterraneo Fondamento del Mausoleo, che fu eretto da Elio Adriano Imp ... (View of the subterranean foundatins of the Mausoleum built by the Emperor Hadrian ...) Vertical section of the buttresses of Hadrian's mausoleum (Spaccato degli Speroni, i quali servono de contrafforti al gran fondamento del Mauso d'elio Adriano)
Giovanni Battista Piranesi

etching

Mackelvie Trust Collection, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, bequest of Dr Walter Auburn, 1982

Giovanni Battista Piranesi
Dismostransi nella Tav presente la Pianta, ed Elevaziona del Ponte oggi detto Quarttro Capai egli e antichissimo, e chiamavasi Fabrizio da L. Fabrizio Presid. delle Strade, che lo fabbrico' nel fine della Repubblica (Shown in this Plate are the plan and elevation of the bridge now called the Ponte dei Quattro Capi (Bridge of the Four Heads) which in antiquity was called the Bridge of Fabricius after L. Fabricius, the Superintendent of the Streets who built it at the end of the Republic 62 BC)
Giovanni Battista Piranesi

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Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, purchased 1971

Giovanni Battista Piranesi
Nella Tav. precedente si sono dimonstrati gli Avanzi del Mausoleo, e del Ponte d'Elio Adriano sino dal loro Fondam. nell presente si riporta il Taglio, o sia Spaccato de' medesimi. (In the previous plate the remains of the Mausoleum and the Bridge of Hadrian were illustrated right through to their foundations. In the present plates a cua-away or section of the same is shown.)
Giovanni Battista Piranesi

etching

Mackelvie Trust Collection, Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, bequest of Dr Walter Auburn, 1982

Giovanni Battista Piranesi