What a fantastical weekend. Honestly it was better than my highest expectations on so many facets. Even though the hostel was a party hostel I was able to sleep really well (to the bumping base just outside my window) and the last minute change from Capri to Positano was a welcomed relief to my eyes as well as my wallet! The phenomenal nature of Positano must be revisited, but perhaps at a later post. What truly warrants mention is my most fortuitous visit to Pompei (scavi), Ercolano (scavi), and the National Museum of Archaeology in Naples. These visits evinced a kind of alarming realization for me. Up until this point I had only been giften with visiting the Renaissance statues, paintings, and frescoes without much ability to compare them to their base. All of these mediums were employed and started because of the ancient Grecian and Roman art that displayed so many of the central concepts adopted by the Renaissance society: humanism, ideal-form, proportional distance, mathematically inclined songs, deep philosophical meaning, grandiose architecture and the likes. The well preserved sites of pompeii and Herculaneum each boasted a proud resemblance to the Renaissance fundamentals (or should I say the Renaissance resembles the excavation sites due to their temporal proximities). Check out this statues that was left in Herculaneum after it was crushed under mudslide caused after the eruption of Mount Vesuvius:
Now pardon me for extrapolating, but the similarities in stance to many of the items we have seen in Firenze and Roma alike are so stark that one cannot help but recognize it:
This and countless other examples were displayed from the time period near the 79 CE eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Mostly from the 2nd and 3rd century CE, these works displayed almost the exact same contra-posta stance that many of the Renaissance crafters found so enthralling in their sculpture works; all the way from Michalangello to Bernini, the ideal forms and mathematical calculations common to the ancients is present throughout the Renaissance work. Pardon me for the picture overload but here is a room full of examples:
These examples of balance, of sculptures in action now no longer scream solely Renaissance to me, but also the ancient Grecian and Roman principles of sculpting that were so crucial to their art. It was finally realized in my mind what exactly was being reborn!
Another crucial aspect to the Renaissance art is the fresco tradition. I don't know that it is necessary to include all representations of this fresco process but here is one to tantalize all your fancies (plus I'm all about superfluity)
And though this possesses an admittedly greater amount of Christian overtones, the similarities in balance, human portrayal, and a reflection of reality is a significant reflection to the Herulaneum (especially well preserved) frescoes seen both in the excavation site itself and in the National Archaeological Museum:
Pardon the nudity but this is ancient European Art and it has been a great challenge to spare you the amount of nudity I have managed thus far. The depictions in both the frescoes portray something very close to reality, or at least ideal reality. The beauty, the elegance, the age! I am in amazement. But to see and connect the very art that inspired the Renaissance truly brought to life the rebirth that took place between 1350 and 1600 in Italy. The mosaics in the Renaissance also bear extreme similarities to those preserved in Herculaneum, and what is most noteworthy is the actual feel for reality those mosaics portray. At the end of it all though, what made me so ecstatic was seeing the great battle of Alexander (the Great). This fantastically old item, so amazing, will never cease to amaze me. I shall leave you with it:
This mosaic is from pompeii and looks just like a painting! I was close enough to touch it but would never dare! Ha! It reminds me of the battle of Constantine picture that I referenced earlier. Not that I am entirely concerned relating all things between Renaissance and the ancients but making connections is just like Pringles. Once you pop the top, the fun don't stop.
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