These are exclusively exhibits of his sculptural and painting works inspired by the pediments of the temple of Aphaia in Aegina.
The exhibition “Beyond classical Greece – O Santiago Clatrava in the Sculpture Gallery” of Munich, reveals the influence that ancient Greek art had on the famous architect. These are exclusively exhibits of his sculptural and painting works inspired by the pediments of the temple of Aphaia in Aegina which have been in the Bavarian capital for 200 years.
In 1811 a group of English and German researchers excavated and brought to light sculptures of exceptional quality from the pediments of the Temple of Aphaia which remained buried. By bribing local provosts, they acquired – among other finds – 17 statues and transported them all via Piraeus to – then British-occupied – Zakynthos, without encountering any obstacle from the Ottoman authorities and then to Malta. The fragmentary surviving masterpieces were auctioned off and finally the highest bidder was the envoy of the Greek-loving king of Bavaria Louis I, Otto’s father. Thus, they ended up – via Italy – in the Munich Sculpture Gallery where they have been exhibited since 1827. They are its most valuable exhibits since they are the most characteristic examples of the shift in ancient Greek art between the late archaic (west pediment) and the early classical (east pediment ) era. On the west side is depicted the first, mythological, Trojan war under Heracles, while on the west the Homeric one.
It was these sculptures that so impressed Santiago Calatrava when he first visited the Munich Gallery more than two decades ago that they prompted him to create the Aeginites, an extensive sculptural and painting work. “Standing before the warriors of the Temple of Aphaia in the Munich Gallery, I witnessed an unexpected modernism that lies beyond the perfection of classicism. What struck me was the rhythm with the shields, the different postures of the human body, man as the measure of all things. Throughout my career, history and culture have played a large role in my design process, which is evident in the Aeginites,” he has said.
The sculptural and painting work which was inspired by the pediments of the temple of Aphaia and was worked on for the last 20 years is presented to the public for the first time in the Munich Sculpture Gallery. The exhibition “Beyond Classical Greece” was edited by Cristina Carrillo de Albornoz, (technical critic and author of books on famous artists such as the Chinese Ai Weiwei or co-authored, as with Calatrava) and o General Director of the Sculpture Gallery, Florian Knauss. This exhibition, which will run until October 23, 2022, offers an unusual artistic dialogue between the permanent collection of antiquities of the Glyptotheka and the artistic work of the famous architect.
“The Aeginites” is a series of 14 large-scale, almost life-size, wrought iron sculptures mounted on an aged oak base and hundreds of designs in the spirit of the dynamic visual compositions of the pediments of the temple of Aphaia, but expressed in a modern visual vocabulary . Thus, they resemble modern, almost abstract versions of ancient warriors.
Since seeing Afaia’s sculptures, Calatrava repeatedly dealt with the figures, with their dynamics, with the so-called “chiasmus” (“counterpoint”), i.e. the counterpoint of a fixed and a relaxed side of the body, which creates in the viewer the sense of movement of the sculptures but also with the play of gravity, which the ancient sculptors took off. Regarding the specific exhibits, the famous architect has said: “I was only concerned with the moment when a warrior is injured and falls. Or the moment of the intention to do something, to make a certain movement.” Therefore, these are not copies of the ancient sculptures, but new interpretations with his own artistic eye: Calatrava’s figures are thin to thin, and do not have bulging muscles, clothing or armor. His figures don’t even have heads. He emphasizes the movement of the limbs in relation to the torso, and his sculptures do not ultimately resemble warriors. The shields have become flat discs, and the depicted figures seem to be playing with them, trying to figure out how to hold them: kneeling or crouching with both hands above their heads or behind their backs. The bodies react to the weight of the discs, lean back, create tension, form counterweights to keep from tipping over from the pressure.
The exhibition at the Munich Sculpture Gallery is entirely devoted to Calatrava’s work as an artist, his sculptures and drawings. There are no models, photographs or architectural design drawings. And yet the architect Calatrava hovers in the atmosphere of the exhibition spaces. One automatically begins to think of the relationships between architecture and sculpture, their respective relationships with space, light and proportions. For Calatrava as a sculptor and architect, man is anyway the measure of all things: “Architecture is like our clothes, made according to the size of our bodies and made for people.” But he considers that “sculpture is superior to architecture in one thing: Detached from any monitoring function, it is freer. But architecture also has a real ace up its sleeve: can anyone get inside. In this way, a building full of sculptures like the Sculpture Gallery is the culmination of all the arts.”
This enlightening exhibition of his work, co-organized by the Munich Sculpture Gallery with the studio of Santiago Calatrava, traces his career as a sculptor and makes clear how the famous architect was generally influenced by the antiquity and heritage of ancient Greece. According to the curator Cristina Carrillo de Albornoz, “This exhibition condenses the main pillars of Santiago Calatrava’s work: his constant interest in the human body, his deep admiration for antiquity and ancient Greece, the work about the dynamic balances and his searches around the modernity movement”.
Along with the “Aeginites”, the exhibition also includes a selection of 30 drawings, watercolors and preliminary studies by the famous architect, as well as a previous series of Cycladic marble sculptures, also inspired by Greek sculptures of the Cyclades. And these works prove Calatrava’s interest on the one hand in nature, which continues to inspire his architectural style, and on the other hand his interest in the depiction of the human body, the great subject that constantly preoccupied ancient Greek art. The renowned architect’s overall sculptural and painting work powerfully demonstrates how Calatrava was influenced by the ancient world and the heritage of Greece.
RES-EMP
View the news feed and get the latest news.
