Composite Creatures in Greek and Roman Antiquity: Art, Science, and Imagination
When and Where
Speakers
Description
The Department of Art History is pleased to announce the next installment in our J. Walter Graham Lecture Series, featuring Prof. Guy Hedreen from Williams College, Williamstown MA.
"Composite Creatures in Greek and Roman Antiquity: Art, Science, and Imagination"
When: Tuesday, Feb. 25, 2025 - 5pm
Where: Paul Cadario Conference Centre, UC
Abstract:
A definitive feature of ancient Greek and Roman art and literature is the representation of a living being, composed of parts of more than one real, present-day species, such as the part-horse, part-man centaur or part-fish, part-woman Skylla. Although the individual parts can be found in the natural world, the combinations do not exist in nature. The popularity of non-existent creatures within the visual and literary arts of antiquity is surprising, because ancient aesthetic theory defined representation as mimēsis, or “imitation,” of reality. In my paper, I explore several different interpretations or explanations of composite creatures, in ancient and modern scholarship, from inside and outside of classical studies, such as narrative theory, cognitive archaeology, and developmental psychology. I emphasize that composite creatures are fundamentally creations of visual representational practices, bodies that materialize through the processes of making particular kinds of art for particular purposes.
Brief bio:
Guy Hedreen is Amos Lawrence Professor of Art at Williams College, where he teaches the history of art, as well as the art, archaeology, literature, and culture of antiquity. He also teaches courses on the reception of the art and literature of antiquity in the early and late modern periods. His most recent book is: The Image of the Artist in Archaic and Classical Greece: Art, Poetry, and Subjectivity (2016). The present paper is part of a new book project, The Making of a Monster: Art, Science, and Imagination in Greek and Roman Antiquity.
