LOUVRE LENS The album 2013 la galerie du temps
Xavier Dectot Jean-Luc Martinez Vincent Pomarède
INTRODUCTION
Xavier Dectot Director of the Louvre-Lens museum
The Grande Galerie forms the heart of the LouvreLens. It welcomes exhibitions conceived for five years from the works conferred to the Louvre’s care and forms, in a way, the permanent collection of the museum in Lens. Like all permanent shows, however, it is not immobile: in Lens, it will be marked by annual rotations that will see certain works leave and replaced by others. What really marks the originality of the first exhibition held here, “La Galerie du Temps”, is the choice of presentation. Occupying all the long gallery conceived by the architect, SANAA, the elegant and daring museography by Studio Adrien Gardère presents the works in a single space, according to a chronological logic. Thus works that, in encylopaedic museums all over the world, are separated because they belong to different civilisations or different techniques confront each other here. And yet the Mesopotamian and Persian worlds were in constant contact with Ancient Greece and Egypt, and in the Middle Ages, as in the 16th and 17th centuries, numerous artists were both painters, sculptors and specialists in other techniques. “La Galerie du Temps” thus offers visitors a unique perception of art history, within the same limits as the collections of the Louvre, starting with the invention of writing in Mesopotamia in the 4th millennium BC and ending with the Industrial Revolution in the mid 19th century, the very moment when the exploitation of coal began in Lens.
antiquity
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The Birth of Writing in Mesopotamia
Girsu, now Tello, Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq) c.2120 BC Diorite Gudea, Prince of the State of Lagash H 70.5 x L 22.4 cm AO 29155 Purchase, 1987
In the 3rd millennium BC, small states ruled by princes who controlled all the powers developed in the region crossed by the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, stretching north as far as Syria. War leader, head of justice and of public buildings, the prince was also the intermediary between the divine world and the human one. The Sumerian royal lists give the names of these mythic sovereigns, such as the hero Gilgamesh, king of Uruk, said to have reigned after the Flood. Several dynasties ruled the state of Lagash, further south. Gudea, who reigned around 2120 BC, is the best-known prince, as the archaeological excavations at Tello have revealed some twenty statues representing him. Carved in a hard stone, diorite, imported from Magan (Oman peninsula), the statuette shows the king wearing a bonnet (of fur?), his hands joined, in a scholarly pose that seeks to evoke the prince’s power and piety.
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the Origins of Mediterranean Civilisations
Syros (Cyclades Islands), Greece c.2700-2300 BC Marble Nude Female Idol with Arms Crossed: Deity? H 62.8 cm MNE 1045 Gift of Mr Cordesse, 1997
Due to their central position between Anatolia and mainland Greece, the Cyclades saw the emergence of a distinctive civilisation in the 4th and 3rd millennia BC, which notably produced pottery and the very first marble sculptures in the Greek world. The function and presentation of these curious statuettes that were much admired by artists at the beginning of the 20th century is unknown. The nude female idol with crossed arms is clearly linked to historic representations of earth mothers giving birth. Some rare figures of musicians in the same style are also known, and some of these works have been discovered in a domestic context, which complicates the debate about their use. The graphic simplification (head in the form of a lyre, angle drawn by the shoulders serving as marker for other parts of the anatomy) is only relative: on other preserved examples, sculpted ears at the back of the head, hardly visible from the front, and traces of painting for eyes and mouth indicate that the works were not lacking in decoration.
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The Ancient Near East in the Time of Babylon
Babylonian Loot, Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq) c.1900 BC Diorite Royal Portrait: Babylonian King Hammurabi? H 15.2 x L 9.7 x D 11 cm Sb 95 Excavations by J. de Morgan Susa (present-day Iran), 1908
Following the “barbarian invasions” from western Syria, the kingdom of Babylon succeeded in reunifying Mesopotamia to its advantage. During the reign of King Hammurabi, who ruled c. 1790–1750 BC, the city became the political, intellectual and religious capital of a vast empire. Famed for his law code, containing 282 articles touching on all aspects of public and private life, which is conserved in the Louvre, Hammurabi is one of the rare historic personnalities from the Ancient Near East who is known to the general public. For a long time this little head of a statue in diorite was considered to portray his features, its round, high-rimmed bonnet designating a royal portrait. The expressiveness of the tired features, marked by age, contrast with the conventional, decorative treatments of the joined eyebrows and the curly beard. But this small masterpiece of sensitivity is undoubtedly a little bit earlier, from around 1900 BC, and must represent an earlier monarch from the same dynasty.
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The Ancient Near East in the Time of Babylon
Marlik Region (present-day Iran) c.1400-1100 BC Terracotta with glossy red slip Vase in the Form of a Hump-Backed Bull H 23 x L 36.5 cm AO 21112 Gift of Mr Foroughi, 1962
During the second half of the 2nd millennium BC, Elam (present-day Iran), situated east of the Mesopotamian plateau, saw a period of brilliant urban civilisation. In the north of this region, nomadic populations from the east of the Caspian Sea, were illiterate yet developed the first ironworking industry. The Marlik necropolis, southwest of the Caspian Sea, has revealed a rich culture which, from 1400 to 1100 BC, produced vases in gold, electrum and silver, as well as some particularly original ceramics made from a very beautiful glossy red clay. The most spectacular vases are in the form of animals: leopard, deer or, as here, a bull with stylised hump, are in fact vessels from which the liquid was poured through a spout on a pipe placed in the muzzle.
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Egypt of the Great Temples
Assiout, Egypt c.1950 BC Painted wood Female Bearer of Offerings H 497 x L 10.1 x D 22 cm E 12001 Excavations at the cemetery at Assiout (Egypt), gift of the French Institute of Oriental Archaeology, 1903
In the 2nd millennium BC, the Egypt contemporary with the Babylonian and Hittite civilisations reached its apogee: territorial conquests extended the frontiers to the south and east of the country, beyond the first Nile cataract towards Nubia, extending as far as Syria: a magnificent period marked by the construction of grand temples in the region of Abydos, at Aswan, Thebes and Abu Simbel. Usually dug out of the bedrock, the tombs at Assiout in Middle Egypt and Thebes in Upper Egypt have revealed funerary furnishings characteristic of the period: blue glazed earthenware statuettes mix with painted wooden models of the servants of death, threedimensional equivalents of the painted decorations of funerary chapels. The bearer of gifts, with a slight bust and bare breasts, her form accentuated by a long dress, is a colourful representative of this characterful funerary art.
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Egypt of the Great Temples
Thebes?, Egypt c.1400–1350 BC Grenadilla and shea woods Touy, Priestess of Min, God of Fertility H 38.4 x L 8 x D 17 cm E10655 Purchase, 1895
It was during the New Kingdom (c.1550–1069 BC) that Egypt became the leading political and military power in the region, extending its frontiers to the south as far as the fourth cataract on the Nile, absorbing all of Nubia, to the northwest towards Libya and to the northeast as far as the Euphrates on the borders of Syria. It was a brilliant epoch, that of the Thutmose, Amenhotep and celebrated Ramses pharoahs, which has left behind a highly refined courtly art. The statuette in grenadilla and shea woods, representing Touy, priestess of Min, god of fertility, is a tiny masterpiece dating from the reign of Amenhotep III (c.1391–1353 BC): the youthful face, the almond eyes, the plump mouth, and the finesse of the carving of the heavy wig and the transparent clothing revealing the slender body make it a summit of the elegance of Amenhotep III style, which liked to extol the charms of Queen Tiy, to whom Touy was no doubt related.
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City-States of the Mediterranean
Boeotia, Greece c.700 BC Terracotta Bell-Shaped Female Idol: Votive or Funerary Object Intended to be Hung H 33 x L 15 cm CA 623 Purchase, 1894
After the troubles that precipitated the fall of the Palatial civilisations in around 1200 BC, the Mediterranean saw a period of fundamental mutation during which a world structured in small city-states emerged. Despite a shared decorative vocabulary in Greece of the archaic period (900–500 BC), regional styles proper to each city developed, whose variety and rapid evolution is endlessly fascinating. The Bell-Shaped Female Idol, made in Boeotia (central Greece) is evidence of a break with the conception of the human body emerging at the same time in Athens. Despite use of a similar decoration for the dress, it shows a highly fantastical composition: the little head stuck on a long neck expresses a different vision of the human body. The object, intended to be hung, was perhaps originally an offering in a tree, though undoubtedly later belonged to the furnishings of a tomb.
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City-States of the Mediterranean
Paros (Cyclades Islands), Greece c.540 BC Marble Nude Youth (Kouros): Statue from the Sanctuary of Asclepios, God of Medecine H 2.03 m MND 888 Purchase, 1920
“La Galerie du Temps” intends to appreciate Greek culture’s fascination with the human body starting with the Cycladic idols of the 3rd millennium BC, and continuing through Roman and later Western art. This has often been explained by religion, which multiplied gods and heroes in human forms far removed from the half-human, half-animal mythical beasts of the East. In fact the repertory inherited in the West is relatively limited. Although animalier sculpture and representations of judges and warriors did exist, Greece transmitted two archetypes to Rome: the draped female and the male nude. The statue of the Nude Youth from the Sanctuary of Asclepios, god of medicine, reminds that this nudity is linked to an athletic ideal, sport was pratised in the nude (from the Greek gumnós, which has given the word “gymnastics”). The attention paid to the joints (knees, wrists, collar-bone...) in order to depict a body in space, betrays the desire to situate the body in an ideal world, source no doubt of the face’s enigmatic smile.
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The Assyrian Empire
Assyria, Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq) c.800–700 BC Bronze Pazuzu, Guardian Demon of the Winds and Evil Demons H 15 x L 8.6 x D 5.6 cm MNB 467 Purchase, 1872
Born in the heart of Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq), the Assyrian Empire (9th–7th centuries BC) reached its maximum extent during the reign of Assurbanipal (668–627 BC) at the head of a territory that included almost all of the Ancient Near East, even annexing Egypt. This moment of political and military hegemony was the origin of a diffusion of culture, literature and science that are a heritage common to the entire Middle East, inherited by the Persians and later the Greeks and Romans. Astronomy and astrology, as well as medicine were born from this. The bronze statue of Pazuzu, Guardian Demon of the Winds and Evil Demons is a reminder that at this epoch, medicine was more or less inseparable from magic. Pazuzu was summoned to chase the evil demons that tormented the sick. Endowed with four wings, for flying in every directions, he cried, according to the inscription engraved on the back of the statue, “I am Pazuzu, son of Hampa. The king of the evil winds that come out of the mountains in a violent rage, is me.”
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The Twilight of Ancient Egypt
Thebes?, Egypt c.945–725 BC Polychrome wood Sarcophagus of the Lady Tanetmit: Lid of the Inner Coffin H 1.95 x L 0.58 x D 0.40 m N2587, N675
During the 1st millennium BC, Egypt saw a period of troubles and political fragmentation. The country faced foreign occupation by dynasties from Libya and the lands of Kouch (present-day Sudan), before being conquered in 664 BC by the Assyrian armies of Assurbanipal, followed by those of the Persians in 525 BC and the arrival of Alexander the Great in 332 BC. These occupations alternated, however, with periods when the local dynasties regained power. These periods were marked by political and cultural renewal, a genuine renaissance in religious architecture and sculpture that paid reference to the great styles of the past. The most notable evolution in the religious thought of the Ancient Egyptians was in their conception of life after death: this saw a true “democratisation” of the practice of mummification, which extended to many individuals. This is therefore the period from which the greatest number and most characteristic funerary pieces survive: the sarcophaguses in painted wood multiply the decoration taken from the Egyptian Book of the Dead.
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The Persian Empire
Susa (present-day Iran) c.500 BC Glazed siliceous bricks Fragment of the Decoration from the Palace of Persian King Darius I: Archer of the Royal Guard H 1.96 x L 0.80 x D 0.2 m Sb 23117 Excavations by R de Mecquenem, Susa (present-day Iran), 1908–1913
The Persian Empire reached its summit during the reign of Darius I (522–486 BC), a noble from the Achaemenid clan. Along with the court silverwork, it is the palaces at Susa and Persepolis that best capture Persian Achaemenid art. The excavations carried out at Susa in 1884 to 1886 and continued in the 20th century have made the Louvre an exceptional repository of the palace art of that time. The fragment of the decoration of the palace at Susa representing an archer is the result of a painstaking reconstitution because the bricks were found scattered after having been reused in later buildings. The palace contained an audience chamber, called the apadana, surrounded by three porticoes supported on thirty-six columns. The north and south walls had twenty bas-reliefs in colour glazed siliceous bricks depicting a frieze of archers each bearing a silver-tipped spear, rendered by a white glaze. The sophisticated court dress nonetheless hardly seems adapted to battle and was doubtless intended to suggest the Persian Nation bearing arms in support of the king.
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Classical Greece
After Naucycles (born in the Peloponese, Greece, active c.400–390 BC) c. AD 130–150 Marble Athlete holding a Discus, Roman copy of a Bronze “Discophorus” H 1.67 m (including plinth) MR 159 Borghese Collection, purchase 1807
Greek classical art (5th to 4th centuries BC) is marked by Athens, which was then restoring its Acropolis. In sculpture, the mastery of the lost wax process permitted the fabrication of large statues in ever-thinner bronze, a technological achievement that favoured the representation of movement. If most of these works have since disappeared, probably melted down during as early as the Antique period, the admiration they aroused among the Romans led to a production of copies in marble, to decorate their baths, gardens and palestras (wrestling schools). The athlete holding a discus, a Roman copy of a bronze Discophorus attributed to the sculptor Naucycles (active c.400–390 BC) is a fine example. The subject – an athletic nude – recalls the link between this artistic genre and the practice of sport in Ancient Greece. However, here it is no longer a question of representing the athlete himself but the concentration necessary for the athlete to throw the discus, a concentration marked by the flexing of the toes on the right foot, seeking its position, and the muscular tension of the arched back.
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The World of Alexander the Great
Babylon, Mespotamia (present-day Iraq) c.200 BC–AD 200 Alabaster, rubies, gold Standing Nude Woman: Companion of the Babylonian Goddess Nanaya, Daughter of the Moon God? H 25 x L 8.6 cm AO 20217 Gift of P H Delaporte, 1866
It is under Alexander the Great, king of Macedonia, that the destiny of the Greek world was overturned. Over the long period that stretched from his reign to the end of the Roman conquest, a new Greek culture gradually became dominant, inventing the museum and accumulating art collections, such as those at Alexandria and Pergamom, spreading a repertory that became common to extremely spread out geographical zones. Art, made from references to previous styles, explored all the techniques and all expressions: painting and mosaic; exploration in sculpture of old age, ugliness or ethnic features; theatrical effects; the dramatisation of the urban setting... Some works attest to this creativity, such as the precious Standing Nude Woman, surely the companion of the Babylonian goddess Nanaya, daughter of the Moon God. She marries the Greek realist model of the female nude, invented for images of Aphrodite, with the eastern exuberance of her parure and eyes and navel incrusted with rubies imported from Burma.
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The Roman Empire
Rome, Italy c.25 BC Marble Octavius Augustus (27 BC– AD 14), Founder of the Roman Empire H 83.5 x L 64 cm M 426 Collection of Cardinal Albani
Roman art was at the service of the Empire, a complex and fragile political system characterised by alternating periods of stability and instability, while at the same time assimilating borrowings from highly diverse civilisations. The features of Octavius Augustus (27 BC–AD 14), considered the true founder of the Roman Empire, are the object of an idealised portrait, which emphasises specific values: the square form of the head and the fork of locks above the right eye are quotations from works of the 5th century BC by the great Greek sculptor Polycletus. As opposed to his enemy Mark Antony, who had himself represented as a Greek king, the emperor thus paid reference to the glorious epoch of Classical Greek democracy, thus reaffirming the values of the Roman Republic, far from monarchical pretentions. Moreover, this is the meaning of the oak leaf crown he is wearing, symbol not of royal distinction, but of the simple leaf crown attributed by the Senate to a Roman citizen. The leather breastplate, while modern, is a reminder that the emperor is usually represented as a war leader, because that was the origin of the power conferred on him by the citizens.
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The Roman Empire
Capitoline Hill, Rome, Italy c. AD 100–200 Marble Relief Representing Mithras, Iranian God of the Sun, Sacrificing the Bull H 2.54 x L 2.75 x D 0.80 m MR 828 Borghese Collection, purchase 1807
Roman religion shows the importance of a culture of imitation that does not express a taste for meaningless repetition but translates an immense capacity for assimilating the contribution of other civilisations. Rome sought to integrate little by little according to its conquests the protective deities of other peoples. The exceptional relief representing Mithras, Iranian God of the Sun, sacrificing the bull, which comes from the large sanctuary dug out under the Capitoline Hill in Rome, is evidence of the success and the diffusion of these Eastern
rites in the heart of imperial Rome. Highly hierarchical and strictly organised in seven stages of initiation, this mysterious cult, whose principal festival, on 25 December, is at the origin of the date fixed for Christmas, was very fashionable in the army: a bull was sacrificed, whose blood was sprayed on the initiate, who shared a meal with the other initiates. The god wears what according to convention designated an oriental: a phrygian bonnet and trousers. This curious religion reveals the belief in a better life, the faithful being associated with divinity.