Like many museums in Europe, most of Rome’s most famous museums don’t allow photography.  (Or, if they do, I’m sorry to say I was unable to take pictures because I was in class while visiting them!)  As a result, most of the images in this installment of Art in Real Life are of famous Italian places, rather than paintings–which, to be honest, I sometimes find more immediately exciting than canvases on a wall in a museum.  These structures are almost all still exactly where they were hundreds of years ago when they were first built, and their size and age is mesmerizing.  Rome is one of the best places in the world to be wonderfully overwhelmed by how old everything is, to wander and lose yourself on the same cobblestones Renaissance greats did. As always, nothing can top actually being there, but hopefully these tourist-y glimpses into Rome will help you feel more like you’re in the city than an art history class’ slides or PowerPoints do.

Click on any of the pictures below to open the gallery; click next (or type “n” on your keyboard) to view the next photo.

TAHB’s Art in Real Life series: Paris | Brussels | Rome

Venus of Willendorf, at the Naturhistorisches Museum, Vienna, Austria. Image by Wikipedia User MatthiasKabel via Wikipedia.

The so-called Venus of Willendorf is one of the oldest and most famous ladies in all of art history, and she’s small enough to fit in the palm of your hand.  Her small size gives us an important clue to the people who made her: she’s portable, hinting that her makers moved around a lot (hunter-gatherers, in other words).  Her 4-inch high frame isn’t the most “realistic” of figures: her female attributes are quite exaggerated.  On top of that, creating figurines of women was much more popular than creating ones of men.  No one knows quite why this is–but most guess that it has something to do with the culture’s great reverence for women’s ability to bear children.

And where does her name come from?  Like almost every single older work of art, this isn’t the name the artist gave her, but rather the name that stuck after her discovery.  Willendorf is the place in Austria where she was found (she now resides in the Naturhistorisches Museum, Vienna).  As for Venus, the ancient Roman goddess of love, she predates classical mythology by over 20,000 years–prehistoric female figures found in the 1920s, like this one, were often bestowed with the name ‘Venus’.

Answer me this What do you think it is is it about this diminuitive statue that has stood the test of time and fascinated people for so long? Does it draw you in the same way?

References & Resources
Gardner’s Art Through the Ages
Christopher L. C. E. Witcombe’s Venus of Willendorf page

Image from the UK Daily Mail

The picture speaks for itself.  Personally, having seen some of the crazy hairstyles Roman women wore (seriously, you will want to click on that link. Just as funny as Roman Elvis up there), I’m a little hesitant to go shouting about Elvis’s long-lost great-great-great-etc. grandfather walking around the Forum… but well, on the other hand, the resemblance certainly is there…

Either way, perhaps the most astounding fact of all this is that Bonham’s, a pretty reputable auction house, is indeed auctioning it off, and it is expected to sell for one million pounds.  See the article in the UK Daily Mail here. Thanks to Gabrielle for this bizarre but entertaining news story!