A strange dream offers hope when plague strikes the citizens of Rome in 293 BCE. They bring a snake back, the god Aesculapius, who saves the city and has a temple on Tiber Island.
Piranesi
Stairs to fall down, to sit in disgrace, or pose with your sibling? Stairs winding up and defying gravity, bearing ballet dancers, or in a Gothic prison.
By the end of the 18th century, remains of Pompeii were being excavated and inspired painters to re-imagine life and death in the city.
Born in Scotland, worked much of his career in Rome, he mentored Benjamin West, worked with Piranesi, and bought Leonardo’s Virgin of the Rocks.
In Rome, in search of the temple of Aesculapius, and in the Gardens of the Villa Borghese, with Corot, Velázquez, Valenciennes, and others.
A visit to Rome, in the paintings of Valenciennes, Turner, Paul Bril, Gérôme, and others, and a little history of landscape painting.
From sacred symbols in a mosaic of Theodora and the Adoration of the Lamb, to roadside watering holes, and the town’s fresh water supply.
Examples of surreal visual art from Bosch in about 1500, through Piranesi’s Imaginary Prison, Richard Dadd, to Félix Vallotton in 1892.
The curious legendary origin of a now vanished temple to Aesculapius on Tiber Island in Rome, shown in paintings and engravings.
Key parts of the background of paintings of the story of the rape of the Sabine Women, this hill was originally a fortress, then the major temple to Jupiter.
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