Portraits d’Arles. Jean-Claude Golvin

24 × 34 cm 48 pages individually printed sheets july 2021 retail price: 24 €

Jean-Claude Golvin is the world’s leading specialist in bringing major sites of Antiquity back to life through images. He is the author of numerous works, including the “Voyages” series published by Errance, Le Génie civil de l’armée romaine (2018) and Le Génie maritime romain (2020).

In 2021, Arles is celebrating 40 years as a Unesco World Heritage Site – a wonderful opportunity to rediscover its ancient treasures. SAve tHe DAte

PORTRAITS OF ARLES

Jean-Claude Golvin

editions errance

“My connection with Arles goes back a long way. Work on reconstructing the towns of Gaul began in Arles and it was one of the first towns that I worked on. It was the first time we worked with the team from the museum, that we discussed the restoration and then carried it out. After that, there were a whole series of works and also the collaboration with Actes Sud. From an early stage, we started publishing books about what I’d done, which created a second, very important and enduring connection with the town and which makes me feel at home there. And there’s a third connection, which is the cultural heritage. I’ve worked on how the town presents itself, on the design of the urban signage that guides visitors to the main sights of the ancient town. And there are also the exhibitions featuring reproductions of the local art, which have proved popular with the public. Naturally, all that is very important. But for me, at the heart of everything is Arles itself – the starting point and end point of everything is Arles.”

Jean-Claude Golvin

Bringing ancient architecture to life is a challenge that Jean-Claude Golvin manages to meet thanks to his knowledge of archaeology and architecture and his talent as an illustrator. This book, which consists of twelve separate sheets that reveal the details of the watercolors in all their glory and can be framed, is devoted to the restoration of the town of Arles of the Roman era. Each image is a huge synthesis, incorporating into a single drawing thousands of pieces of information published across hundreds of pages and often the fruit of a century of excavations. In a single glance, it has become possible to contemplate a site in its entirety and to understand its history and how it functioned.

This book is the first in a series that will take us to the heart of ancient and Mediterranean civilisations through large-format watercolors: on one side the watercolor (48 × 34 cm) and on the other the key. We began with Arles, because Jean-Claude Golvin has donated all his watercolors to the Museum of Ancient Arles.