This focus exhibition examines the intersection of public-facing art and political propaganda during the reign of Roman Emperor Septimius Severus (193–211 CE). Severus, the Libyan-born founder of the Severan dynasty, and his Syrian-born wife, Julia Domna, used their portraits to center themselves as the rightful rulers of an increasingly complex and multicultural society.
With a selection of important coins displayed alongside the Eskenazi Museum's remarkable marble portraits of Severus and Domna, the exhibition explores themes such as military imagery, images connected to past emperors, and a campaign to keep future emperors within the family. Ideas that relate identity to place and religion are also important factors that functioned in new ways during the Severan period.
The exhibition builds on the recently published book, Imperial Colors, by Julie Van Voorhis and Mark Abbe. A video in the gallery presents an overview of this research, shedding light on how art historians and scientists discover new information about ancient objects.
Description of the video:
[voice-over] To go back to the beginning the very beginning of my existence is to go back more than 2,000 years. My creators were a talented team of sculptors and painters who skillfully ensured that I visually represented the physical appearance of Roman Empress Julia Domna. These artists created me as part of a pair of portrait busts. The other sculpted bust is a portrait of my husband, Roman Emperor Septimius Severus. We were made with great care using the finest marble. The marble was polished smooth in some areas and depicts a variety of textures in others. We were presented as if we were in motion, with drilled indentations in our eyes designed to catch the light. These aspects, along with others, make us appear remarkably lifelike.
[Juliet Graver Istrabadi] When I came here there were these two beautiful sculptures and people were going into the gallery and looking at them and they were enjoying them because they are really beautiful sculptures, but they are more than just beautifully carved representations of two human beings. They really do have a larger message, and through my own study of ancient art and knowing Julie Van Voorhis, we sort of wanted to tell that larger story.
[Julie Van Voorhis] It's a different kind of story because imperial portraits are more than anything else representations of power. We know who they are and we know they were rulers of a big empire. These sculpture portraits, sculpted portraits are again not just representations of what they look like but they are political propaganda. They are being used to present the image of the emperor in a way that the emperor wants their audience to understand them, because most people in the Roman Empire never would have laid eyes on their Emperor. And so these consistent images were very important for giving the Roman people a sort of a connection to their emperor. When you see the portrait of the emperor and it has those four locks of hair on the forehead, those locks of hair are references to the god Serapis, who is a Greco-Egyptian god, so even something like hair which is we think of just part of how we look, becomes almost unnatural in a way because it's being um harnessed to a specific message or meaning that the emperor is trying to convey through his images.
[voice-over] In 1975 we were purchased for the Indiana University Art Museum now the Eskenazi Museum of Art. In 2015 the Eskenazi Museum embarked on an interdisciplinary research project, inviting a group of art historians, scientists and conservators to study us. We were analyzed, our history was researched, and we were carefully subjected to a battery of tests. Even though ancient sculptures are known to have been painted, it is unusual for original paint to be preserved and the Eskenazi Museum research team was excited to find traces of pigment. The method with which paint was applied is still not fully understood, but the Severan Tondo, a painted portrait of Septimius Severus, Julia Domna, and their sons that is as old as we, are provides additional information. The research team experimented by digitally overlaying the Tondo portraits onto our sculpted surfaces. These experiments, along with the discovery that the pigment was layered and mixed in various ways, fueled the research team's efforts to develop experimental reconstructions of our original colorful appearance. It is clear that both of us were wearing imperial purple cloaks, which is notable because it signifies high status for the empress as well as the emperor. In addition to exploring color variations, broken parts were also digitally restored and we were placed once again on bases, giving a better idea of how we would likely have been displayed. The way that we were designed carved and painted tells a story. We are amazingly naturalistic but we were made to serve political purposes. We communicated power and status, proclaiming to the Romans that Septimius Severus and Julia Domna were the rightful rulers of a vast empire. We still speak to new generations about the power of art.
