Periodic Reporting for period 1 - REFRAME (Greek Funerary and Votive Reliefs Reused for Display in the Ancient Mediterranean. A Long-term, Interdisciplinary, and Cross-cultural Approach)
Periodo di rendicontazione: 2020-09-01 al 2023-08-31
Many of the Greek and Roman antiquities that we see in Museums nowadays have had complex itineraries through time and space. They were not simply produced for a specific purpose, then been discarded and buried before being rediscovered in modern times. Already in antiquity some of them went through many transformations, being sometimes moved to different places and becoming part of new assemblages.
REFRAME addresses Greek and Roman attitudes toward and interest in antique artefacts by focusing specifically on marble reliefs sculpted in Greece from the sixth to the second centuries BCE that after exhausting their original function as gravestones in cemeteries, or as votive gifts in sanctuaries were reused and put on display in a new context.
Why, and how, were old Greek tombstones and small votive gifts capable of affecting people in different cultural areas and periods from Antiquity right through to our times?
As Europeans, our shared identity and memory are deeply rooted in the process through which these reliefs were preserved to our days, from their reuse for display in Antiquity right through to current policies for protection and enhancement of Cultural Heritage. REFRAME traces the itineraries of these reliefs over time and space without privileging specific phases, in order to actualize the different times and places when and where they were active as well as to reactivate the different relations among people, other objects, and spaces they were - and are - part of.
The project has achieved three main objectives:
1) It has established a new model for addressing Greek funerary and votive reliefs reused for display in antiquity by providing a new approach to this topic based on the itineraries of these objects over time and space as well as by adopting a multidisciplinary methodology (combining archaeology, art history, and natural sciences) for the study of the material.
2) It has provided new knowledge about the Greek and Roman attitudes toward and interest in antique artefacts and has disclosed new opportunities for comparative research in other historical periods and cultural areas.
3) It has developed a new museum communication strategy to bring knowledge to the public of the itineraries of Greek funerary and votive reliefs over time, bridging ancient and contemporary interest for antique artefacts.
REFRAME addresses Greek and Roman attitudes toward and interest in antique artefacts by focusing specifically on marble reliefs sculpted in Greece from the sixth to the second centuries BCE that after exhausting their original function as gravestones in cemeteries, or as votive gifts in sanctuaries were reused and put on display in a new context.
Why, and how, were old Greek tombstones and small votive gifts capable of affecting people in different cultural areas and periods from Antiquity right through to our times?
As Europeans, our shared identity and memory are deeply rooted in the process through which these reliefs were preserved to our days, from their reuse for display in Antiquity right through to current policies for protection and enhancement of Cultural Heritage. REFRAME traces the itineraries of these reliefs over time and space without privileging specific phases, in order to actualize the different times and places when and where they were active as well as to reactivate the different relations among people, other objects, and spaces they were - and are - part of.
The project has achieved three main objectives:
1) It has established a new model for addressing Greek funerary and votive reliefs reused for display in antiquity by providing a new approach to this topic based on the itineraries of these objects over time and space as well as by adopting a multidisciplinary methodology (combining archaeology, art history, and natural sciences) for the study of the material.
2) It has provided new knowledge about the Greek and Roman attitudes toward and interest in antique artefacts and has disclosed new opportunities for comparative research in other historical periods and cultural areas.
3) It has developed a new museum communication strategy to bring knowledge to the public of the itineraries of Greek funerary and votive reliefs over time, bridging ancient and contemporary interest for antique artefacts.
• REFRAME provided significant new knowledge about the practice of reusing funerary and votive reliefs produced in Greece from the late 6th to the 2nd centuries BCE both at quantitative and qualitative level. The systematic survey done by means of fieldwork (visits to Museums and archaeological sites in Greece), library, and archive research resulted in a better appreciation of the occurrences of this practice in the funerary, religious, and domestic domain, allowing to collect new evidence regarding the reuse of funerary reliefs and to gather for the first time a corpus of votive reliefs reused in ancient Greece.
• It established a new conceptual and methodological model to address the reuse of Greek funerary and votive reliefs from a long-term, cross-cultural, and interdisciplinary perspective by applying a case studies research strategy that focused on the value and impact of the reliefs over time and space from their origin right through their musealization and beyond, without privileging specific phases. As to the methodology, a votive relief for Cybele in the Thorvaldsen Museum was addressed as a case study and investigated in depth in collaboration with other researchers and scientists. In particular, the provenance of the marble used to carve the relief was investigated by integrating archaeometric methods (stable isotope analysis and minero-petrographic examination of a thin section) and the polychromy of the relief was analyzed by means of multispectral imaging and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, to identify traces of repainting or later interventions.
• It provided and tested a new museum communication model by conceiving and curating the pop-up exhibition “From Greece to Copenhagen. The itineraries of two reliefs”, organized at the Thorvaldsen Museum from May 25 to August 28, 2023 in collaboration with the curatorial and communication staff of the museum. The research and curatorial work carried out for planning and organizing this pop-up exhibition succeeded in establishing a feasible, sustainable, and replicable model that can be easily employed by other cultural heritage institutions interested in sharing with the public the results of scientific research regarding the itineraries of ancient sculptures.
• It established an international network of scholars dealing with sculptural reuse from different disciplinary perspectives through the organization of two workshops and the co-organization of a conference. In particular, the workshop organized at the Danish Institute at Athens addressed the topic of reframing antique sculptures in Roman Greece, presenting new evidence and investigating the phenomenon in Greece from different perspectives and in different periods. The conference co-organized in Pisa has extended the comparison geographically focusing on Greek sculptures reused in Rome and other Mediterranean cities and on their active role in past and present. Through the final workshop in Copenhagen, the Greco-Roman attitudes toward and interest in antique artefacts were discussed within a wider comparative and interdisciplinary framework, by bringing together archaeologists, art historians, and museum professionals as well as by addressing theoretical and methodological challenges. The achieved results will be exploited after the conclusion of the project through the publication of a collective edited volume.
• It developed and implemented a database for processing and sharing the data generated and collected by the research with the widest possible community, including scholars, students, museum professional, and the general public.
• It established a new conceptual and methodological model to address the reuse of Greek funerary and votive reliefs from a long-term, cross-cultural, and interdisciplinary perspective by applying a case studies research strategy that focused on the value and impact of the reliefs over time and space from their origin right through their musealization and beyond, without privileging specific phases. As to the methodology, a votive relief for Cybele in the Thorvaldsen Museum was addressed as a case study and investigated in depth in collaboration with other researchers and scientists. In particular, the provenance of the marble used to carve the relief was investigated by integrating archaeometric methods (stable isotope analysis and minero-petrographic examination of a thin section) and the polychromy of the relief was analyzed by means of multispectral imaging and Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, to identify traces of repainting or later interventions.
• It provided and tested a new museum communication model by conceiving and curating the pop-up exhibition “From Greece to Copenhagen. The itineraries of two reliefs”, organized at the Thorvaldsen Museum from May 25 to August 28, 2023 in collaboration with the curatorial and communication staff of the museum. The research and curatorial work carried out for planning and organizing this pop-up exhibition succeeded in establishing a feasible, sustainable, and replicable model that can be easily employed by other cultural heritage institutions interested in sharing with the public the results of scientific research regarding the itineraries of ancient sculptures.
• It established an international network of scholars dealing with sculptural reuse from different disciplinary perspectives through the organization of two workshops and the co-organization of a conference. In particular, the workshop organized at the Danish Institute at Athens addressed the topic of reframing antique sculptures in Roman Greece, presenting new evidence and investigating the phenomenon in Greece from different perspectives and in different periods. The conference co-organized in Pisa has extended the comparison geographically focusing on Greek sculptures reused in Rome and other Mediterranean cities and on their active role in past and present. Through the final workshop in Copenhagen, the Greco-Roman attitudes toward and interest in antique artefacts were discussed within a wider comparative and interdisciplinary framework, by bringing together archaeologists, art historians, and museum professionals as well as by addressing theoretical and methodological challenges. The achieved results will be exploited after the conclusion of the project through the publication of a collective edited volume.
• It developed and implemented a database for processing and sharing the data generated and collected by the research with the widest possible community, including scholars, students, museum professional, and the general public.
• The database significantly contributes to current research on Greek funerary and votive reliefs reused for display in antiquity, integrating new evidence and offering a more comprehensive overview of the phenomenon.
• The new approach to the topic based on objects itineraries advances current knowledge on the interest for antique artefacts in different periods and cultural areas, contributing to current long-term comparative research on reuse, antiquarianism, and collecting.
• The papers delivered at the organized workshops, which will be published after the end of the fellowship, contribute to advance current knowledge about sculptural reuse, in Greece and in other cities of the ancient Mediterranean, as well as to promote new approaches to the multi-temporality of reused sculptures in Classical Archaeology and other disciplines.
• The museum communication model contributes to current scholarly discussion regarding how to enhance and communicate research on museum collections in sustainable, inclusive, and participatory ways by means of new digital tools.
• The work carried out can contribute towards European Cultural Heritage and European Research policy objectives and strategies with regard to improving knowledge, preservation, and dissemination of cultural heritage, sharing research data under FAIR principles, promoting knowledge exchange across EU and non-EU countries.
• The new approach to the topic based on objects itineraries advances current knowledge on the interest for antique artefacts in different periods and cultural areas, contributing to current long-term comparative research on reuse, antiquarianism, and collecting.
• The papers delivered at the organized workshops, which will be published after the end of the fellowship, contribute to advance current knowledge about sculptural reuse, in Greece and in other cities of the ancient Mediterranean, as well as to promote new approaches to the multi-temporality of reused sculptures in Classical Archaeology and other disciplines.
• The museum communication model contributes to current scholarly discussion regarding how to enhance and communicate research on museum collections in sustainable, inclusive, and participatory ways by means of new digital tools.
• The work carried out can contribute towards European Cultural Heritage and European Research policy objectives and strategies with regard to improving knowledge, preservation, and dissemination of cultural heritage, sharing research data under FAIR principles, promoting knowledge exchange across EU and non-EU countries.