Rupert Wace
14 Old Bond Street
+44 (0)20 7495 1623
London
In our own Image:
Gods and Mortals
in Antiquity
June 4-July 18
Is man made in God’s image or has man made God in his own image? Throughout the millennia man has sought to represent humanity in images of stone, metal, terracotta and paint and in this pursuit has never been far from the company of his gods. Rupert Wace has been collecting works of art on this theme for many years, and now presents them in a fascinating exhibition In our own Image: Gods and Mortals in Antiquity. The exhibition brings together important sculpture from Ancient Egypt and the Classical World spanning a period of some 3,000 years, which depict gods in mortal guise and idealised representations of gods and goddesses as well as images of kings, princes and heroes, all illuminating how the human form has been portrayed through the ages.
Thousands of years ago on the Greek Cycladic islands, small marble figures were produced that either represented a goddess or were images of deceased women, buried with them for some votive reason. These mysterious images, so abstracted, seem to our modern eyes to predict the simplified forms of the great Modern sculptors of the 20th century, such as Brancusi, Picasso and Arp. The delicate marble head of a female figure dating from circa 2600-2500 BC is a particularly elegant example. The lyre-shaped head is of the Spedos type, named after a cemetery on the island of Naxos, and was formerly in the New York collections of C. Dikran Kelekian, New York, 1966, and Evelyn Annenberg Hall.
Amongst the sculptures from Ancient Egypt is a life-size head of the pharaoh Tutankhamun (reigned 1336-1327 BC) in the guise of Amun, an important primordial Egyptian god whose name means ‘the hidden one’. After the wholesale desecration of the images of Egypt’s gods by Akhenaten, his successor Tutankhamun re-established the old religion and it is perhaps no surprise that in depictions of the great god Amun we see the young ruler’s distinctive features, here emphasized by the subtle sheen of the polished limestone. The head comes from a private collection in France, acquired around the 1950s.
Another sculpture from Egypt is the bronze statuette of Isis suckling her child Horus. This tender image of the great mother goddess of Egypt is echoed by the myriad depictions of Mary and the Christ child. From a private British collection, this statuette dates from the Late Dynastic Period, circa 600 BC.
The Greek hero Herakles (also known as Hercules) is depicted on an Attic black-figure neck-amphora with lid dating from the 6th century BC. One side of the vase shows Herakles’ apotheosis or journey to immortality. The goddess Athena, his protector, is driving a four-horse chariot and Hermes, identifiable from his winged boots and hat, guides them to the realm of the gods. Here we see a mortal about to join the immortals, a miraculous occurrence. This is one of the very first representations of this scene and the painting is attributed to the Leagros Group. The vase was formerly in a private German collection, acquired in the early 1980s.
An important 3rd century BC Hellenistic marble head depicts Alexander the Great, the young Greek king who conquered Egypt and much of the known world. Although obviously a portrait, the head shows him in an idealized form. Lit up with immortality, his gaze is already directed away from the world and its everyday cares. Probably from a complete statue of Alexander, it comes from Ashmounein (ancient Hermopolis) in Egypt, and was acquired in 1933 by a German collector.
Three other fine Hellenistic pieces in the exhibition are: a terracotta female head from the late 4th/3rd century BC; a late 2nd or early 1st century BC bronze statuette of a prince; and a marble Aphrodite from the same period. The finely featured terracotta head, perhaps from Taranto or Etruria, is remarkable for its verisimilitude and comes from a private American collection, acquired in 1978.
The magnificent bronze of a slender naked male is a portrait of a Hellenistic prince, probably Mithridates VI Eupator, king of Pontus, a youthful ruler in Anatolia. Although it harks back to the iconography of Alexander, in its life-like twisting pose it embodies a new and exuberant baroque sensibility. The statuette’s face is framed by long hair bound in a silver diadem spiralling from the crown in thick locks over his shoulders. It was formerly in a private UK collection.
Perhaps the centrepiece of the exhibition is the marble figure of Aphrodite. The goddess of love is shown turning towards us, shielding her nakedness as if surprised by our presence. The type, known as the Aphrodite of Knidos, is, with the Laocoon, one of the most famous sculptures of the ancient world. Copied throughout antiquity, it is also a corner-stone in the history of classical art. The original was so famous that Pliny describes it as a tourist attraction. Although there were numerous representations of nude men, soldiers, athletes and gods from the Archaic period onwards, this was the first Greek female nude. She pretends to be demure and tries, very ineffectively, to cover her modesty but this is an act in order to captivate the male observer. This example comes from a private UK collection, acquired between 1968 and 1978.
Rupert Wace has been dealing in antiquities for over 30 years and opened his own business in 1988. He is Vice Chairman of the Antiquities Dealers Association in the UK and a member of the Board of the International Association of Dealers in Ancient Art, both of which rigorously uphold the ethics of dealing in ancient art and whose members follow a strict code of ethics concerning the authenticity and provenance of the objects they sell. Rupert Wace is also a member of BADA and CINOA. Wace’s clients include major international collectors as well as some of the world’s great museums such as the British Museum and the Ashmolean Museum in the UK; the Musée du Louvre, Paris; the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; the Antikenmuseum, Basel, and the Staatliche Museum in Munich. |
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Cycladic Marble Head from a Female Figure, Early Spedos, c. 2600-2500 BC, Height 5.6 cm.
Egyptian Bronze Statuette of Isis and Horus, Late Dynastic Period, c. 600 BC, Height: 18.2 cm.
Hellenistic Bronze Statuette of a Prince, Late 2nd/early 1st century BC, Height: 14.3 cm.
Hellenistic Marble Head of Alexander the Great, 3rd century BC, Height: 18.5 cm. |
