On the basis of their remarkable similarity to paintings in the Villa Farnesina in Rome the Boscotrecase frescoes most likely were executed by artists from the capital city ensembles that are at once colorful and complex The occupants and those who visited the villa at Boscotrecase were not greeted by grand vistas of architectural splendor and especially decorative architectural forms playfully alluding to contemporary cultural and political concerns Greece and Rome. Introduction by Joan Mertens. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1987. See on MetPublications Anderson, Maxwell L. Pompeiian Frescoes in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. MMA Bulletin 45. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1987. See on MetPublications Milleker, Elizabeth J., ed. The Year One: Art of the Ancient World East and West. Exhibition catalogue. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000. See on MetPublications “The Augustan Villa at Boscotrecase.” In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/bsco/hd_bsco.htm (October 2004) More from the Timeline of Art HistoryView all trying to imagine the apocalyptic scene the Roman author and naval commander Pliny the Elder witnessed from his home along the Bay of Naples exactly 1,939 years ago today According to his 18-year-old nephew Pliny the Younger’s heart-stopping firsthand account the sky turned black as Mount Vesuvius erupted spewing fire and ash over Pompeii and its neighboring towns as well as thousands of its inhabitants—including the eminently quotable Elder statesman—were buried It was a movie-quality tragedy that today may incite a fear of increased natural disasters in our own age of rapid global warming But the event also served to freeze a moment in the past and the perfectly preserved ruins—petrified over the centuries—offer the world’s most complete picture of ancient Roman life Pompeii and its surrounding cities were something like the Hamptons of Rome Prominent Romans would retreat to their villas on the picturesque bay a single day’s sail from the hustling imperial capital and Nero all owned houses in the town of Baiae Augustus vacationed in Surrentum and Pausilypon and bought the entire island of Capreae (Capri) His son Tiberius built multiple villas on the island and even ruled the empire from there in the last decade of his life who dubbed the bay “the crater of all delights,” had several properties where he would work on his writing and the poet Virgil also had a residence in the area The richly adorned villas of this region were pure pleasure palaces offering everything a hardworking professional would possibly need to relax: gymnasia and libraries; courtyards and gardens watered by aqueducts; baths heated and cooled with snow from the peak of Vesuvius; and loggias and terraces with sweeping vistas of the sea and the countryside It is the picture galleries and lavishly painted rooms adorned with frescoes (in which pigment is applied to wet plaster) that speak most clearly to the inhabitants’ ambition and taste The extraordinary splendor of the imperial villas set high standards in the region and the sculptors and painters employed by the emperors were also commissioned to decorate the homes of the urban and suburban elite in Pompeii and Herculaneum the home played a key part in reinforcing the patrician’s social position as he would receive his clients in the atrium each day These wall works are also some of the only paintings from this time that survive in the present; the few ancient literary references to Roman painting usually concern portable examples on materials like wood and ivory the history of Roman painting is almost entirely dominated by these durable frescoes It’s precisely because Vesuvius buried these cities that these works have remained bright and intact Detail with pine tree and pomegranate in the garden fresco from the Villa of Livia at Prima Porta in Rome at the Palazzo Massimo alle Terme Some of the best descriptions of Roman wall painting history and techniques can be found in Pliny the Elder’s Natural History and in Vitruvius’s manual De Architectura it was Studius “who first instituted that most delightful technique of painting walls with representations of villas coastlines.” The latter described fresco as “a blinding vision.” These elaborate paintings remained hidden until Pompeii was rediscovered in the 16th century largely to procure precious antiquities and works of art for the king frescoes were stripped from walls and framed though many others were damaged or irreparably destroyed German scholar August Mau published his History of Decorative Wall Painting in Pompeii creating a system for categorizing 200 years’ worth of frescoes into a range of four decorative styles His work still provides the standard framework for the study of ancient Roman painting Mau observed that these styles fed off of one another over the centuries becoming more detailed and complex as ambitions and social tastes shifted and did they really reach their apex at Vesuvius’s eruption Reconstruction of a Roman cubiculum (bedroom) from Bilbilis the Roman government imported costly marble to decorate the walls the wealthier among them commissioned artists to paint imitations of precious materials like yellow Mau characterized this as the “Incrustation Style,” popular from approximately 200 to 60 B.C.E painters became so adept at this technique that the faux-marble slabs even showed veins with each rectangle of painted “marble” connected by stucco mouldings that added a three-dimensional effect Artists of the late Republican period drew upon examples of early Hellenistic painting and architecture (which came from Greece in the late 4th to 3rd centuries B.C.E.) in order to simulate masonry the wall was divided into three horizontal zones each crowned with simple stucco decorations based on the Doric architectural order Examples of this style can be found in the private homes known as the House of the Faun and the House of Salluste both of which can still be visited in Pompeii The decline of the First Style coincided with the Roman colonization of Pompeii in 80 B.C.E. which transformed what had essentially been an Italic town with Greek influences into a Roman city Detail of the cubiculum (bedroom) from the Villa of P Courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art 80–late 1st century B.C.E.) that followed is characterized by illusionistic renderings of architectural elements like columns Artists also began to borrow from the figural repertoire of Hellenistic wall painting and heroes (though the Second Style did retain elements of the First such as faux marble blocks along the base of walls) Prefiguring Renaissance experiments by over 1,000 years this style employed shading and perspective to trick the viewer into thinking they were looking through a window In the triclinium (dining room) of the Villa of Livia (named after the wife of Emperor Augustus), a stunning garden fresco decorates all four walls of the room with life-size representations of trees, flowers, fruit, and birds, creating the feeling of being outdoors. This style anticipates Rococo decorating schemes that sought to bring nature indoors Fresco depicting a Bacchian rite from the Dionysiac Mysteries in the Villa of the Mysteries Fresco showing a garden scene from the House of the Golden Bracelet Perhaps the most famous and beguiling example of the style can be found in the Villa of Mysteries in Pompeii which contains the renowned fresco of the Dionysiac Mysteries generally thought to show the rites of initiation to an ancient religious cult dedicated to the god of revelry and wine Amid architectural views and colonnades set against a red background (this favored pigment has since been named “Pompeii Red”) are life-size depictions of Dionysus and Silenus who commingle with a priestess and a dancing satyr The scale meant that viewers were implicated in the scenes making for a powerful religious experience Those unable to travel to Italy can still experience something of this style’s unique majesty. In its Greek and Roman galleries, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has reconstructed the cubiculum (bedroom) from the Villa of P A series of elaborately painted landscapes viewed through opulent realistically rendered architecture creates the feeling that the villa’s walls are really windows Pair of swans from the imperial villa at Boscotrecase Egyptianizing scene from the imperial villa at Boscotrecase 20 B.C.E.–20 C.E.) rejected illusion in favor of surface ornamentation monochromatic fields of color (usually red Instead of representations of architectural elements drawn from real life this style depicted implausibly stylized columns and pediments conjured from the artist’s imagination Vitruvius took issue with this technique in De Architectura criticizing the paintings for distorting reality: “For instance fluted appendages with curly leaves and volutes candelabra supporting representations of shrines and on top of their pediments numerous tender stalks and volutes growing up from the roots and having human figures senselessly seated upon them.” Egypt was annexed by Rome after the death of Cleopatra in 30 B.C.E. and the Third Style also saw the introduction of Egyptian themes and imagery Wall paintings on black ground: from the imperial villa at Boscotrecase The stunningly elegant “Black Room” at the Met—a recreated bedroom from the villa of Agrippa Postumus at Boscotrecase—encapsulates this political moment a friend of the emperor Augustus and husband of his daughter Julia owned one of the most sumptuous summer homes along the bay its paintings executed by artists working for the imperial household (the Met’s version incorporates surviving panels from the original room) The room’s black walls appear at once flat and limitless almost weightless candelabra and columns embellished with jewel-like decorations support minute but exquisitely painted vignettes tiny landscapes that float in the middle of the monochrome walls patron god of Augustus—perch upon delicate architecture Decorations also include yellow panels with Egyptian motifs and painted medallions with portraits of members of the imperial family Such dwellings seem to evidence the tension between Apollonian restraint and Dionysian indulgence Roman senator Cato the Elder and other moralists cautioned against the excessive display of wealth but their words had more traction in the city of Rome than in the splashy villas along the Bay of Naples Fresco depicting a scene of sacrifice in honor of the goddess Diana in the triclinium of the House of the Vettii The Fourth Style, politely called the “Intricate Style” (ca. 20–79 C.E.), can be best described as a combination of the three styles that came before it, and was a kind of baroque reaction to the Third’s mannerism Pliny the Elder claimed that it was developed by an eccentric painter named Famulus faux marble blocks appear along the base of walls These frame illusionistic renderings and large-scale narrative paintings from the Second Style flat planes of color and unlikely architecture These paintings do look as busy as they sound and feature heady combinations of mythological Fourth Style wall paintings are not only a pastiche of what came before but endeavored to transform domestic spaces into pinacothecae (picture galleries) brothers Aulus Vettius Conviva and Aulus Vettius Restitutus—who have been been identified as successful former slaves or freedmen—decorated their house to display their rising social status detailed frescoes of mythological scenes that survive today reflect themes of divine reward and punishment One painting illustrating the punishment of Ixion reinforces the omnipotence of Jupiter (a.k.a while a scene showing a sacrifice in honor of the goddess Diana reflects the patrons’ humility offers some levity as he weighs his frankly gigantic phallus on a set of scales (in fact quite a bit of erotic art has been unearthed in the homes of Pompeii) Romans in other parts of the empire did continue to paint their homes yet there is no clear Fifth or Sixth Style; later Roman painting simply re-combined elements of earlier styles the unearthed villas along the Bay of Naples crystalize a momentous development in ancient art and reveal that Romans enjoyed lives that many contemporary viewers could only hope to live A documentary approach of the iconic landscape shaped by Vesuvius historic and present-day photographic representations and stories inscribed in this cyclical landscape It is considered to be the first volcanic eruption ever photographed with the next eruption dangerously looming each period of quietude to forgetfulness and complacency I am not burnt interweaves documentary writing and photography in a constellation of subjects ranging from the historic and present-day observatories twelve students who perished near the crater government workers standing around a bonfire and lovers parked along the nightly road leading up the volcano As each eruption adds a layer on top of the last I am not burnt uses documentary photography as a research perspective into a landscape that is documentary in its own right As each eruption adds a layer upon a previous one the documentary possibilities of photography seem limited to what’s visible at the surface I am not burnt departs from the properties classically attributed to documentary photography – its said potential to approach a subject ‘in depth’ to lay bare a ‘hidden and deeper truth’ – and opens new and radical possibilities In considering the literal and figural surface as ground for documentary I am not burnt appears as series of photographic and textual documents embedded in a speculative I am not burntMichiel De Cleene & Arnout De Cleene2024Roma Publications 462162 pages I am not burnt is part of Documenting Objects a research project at KASK & Conservatorium The World Heritage Committee has approved the proposed extension of the Buffer Zone of the UNESCO site "Archaeological Areas of Pompeii Herculaneum and Torre Annunziata," at the end of a process that lasted about 10 years.Ten municipalities are involved and gravitating in the territory of the new Buffer Zone which now reaches atotal extension of 17.26 square kilometers that includes Portici The approved proposal was put forward in 2021 and its formulation stems from the coordinated work conducted by the Pompeii Archaeological Park and the Herculaneum Archaeological Park in synergy with the UNESCO Office of the Ministry of Culture The new perimeter of the buffer zone takes into account a number of requests and suggestions put forward by the World Heritage Committee and stems from the shared intention to strengthen the strategies for the protection of the serial site and to inspire the redevelopment and regeneration activities of the surrounding territories by these Central to the proposal submitted by the Ministry was the protection of the landscape and views to and from archaeological sites the target territory has been the subject of a strategic plan the objectives of which are to enhance the area’s tourist attractiveness improve accessibility to the sites of culture environmentally restore degraded and compromised landscapes For the implementation of the strategic plan during 2022 the Institutional Development Contract (CIS) “Vesuvius-Pompeii-Naples” was signed which provides for the financing of twenty projects for a total of 156 million euros and an additional fourteen interventions assessed as high priority by the Ministry of Culture and directly funded for a total of more than 70 million euros the management plan related to the UNESCO Site is being drafted and updated oriented towards participatory governance through agreements with local authorities actively involving citizens who are called upon to protect and enhance the priceless heritage of this place “UNESCO’s approval of the expansion of the Pompeii-Herculaneum-Torre Annunziata buffer zone is an important result and the achievement of a fundamental objective in the path of continuous enhancement protection and sustainable development of an area rich in extraordinary historical evidence with the universal value of a World Heritage site,” said Minister of Culture Gennaro Sangiuliano “This is a confirmation of the far-sightedness of the project which now receives a further boost to the realization of that great archaeological area that transcends the boundaries of individual cities to bring them together in a large My thanks for the work done go to the mayors of the municipalities involved to the directors of the Archaeological Parks of Pompeii and Herculaneum thanks to funding from the ’Vesuvius-Pompeii-Naples Institutional Development Contract’ and additional funds made available by the Ministry it is time to implement those projects that will bring further sap and growth to the whole area.” “We are overjoyed to have achieved this success the result of a team effort for which I thank the Ministry of Culture the Great Pompeii Unit and our colleagues in Herculaneum,” said Pompeii Archaeological Park Director Gabriel Zuchtriegel our vision of the ’Greater Pompeii,’ a network of sites in which we will invest more than 230 million euros in the coming years finally finds an appropriate institutional framework that sees the main players in the area gathered around a table to make the sites around Pompeii a large widespread park that allows visitors to discover an area rich in culture and traditions “One can only express satisfaction with this approval which appears to be a marked improvement on the approach inherited from the time of the site’s inscription as a World Heritage Site,” added Herculaneum Archaeological Park Director Francesco Sirano “The proposal stems from the desire to share and promote the common recognition of the wonderful and unique relationship between the ancient city of Herculaneum the territory and the communities around it opening the perspective toward the cultural and scenic riches at the foot of the volcano that map the history of this place before and after the eruption of 79 AD It seems to me that I can hope that also thanks to this Buffer Zone we can advance in the work of engagement and awareness that we carry on also thanks to the more than 20-year public-private partnership with the philanthropic Packard Humanities institute: ancient Herculaneum is not an island in the sea of past and distant time but part of a living landscape with many layers of history The Villa Described in LiteratureThe term villa designates several types of structure that share a natural setting or agrarian purpose Included in the architecture of a villa may be working structures devoted to farming The villa is therefore most aptly understood as a label or identity capturing several distinct parts sometimes interrelated or dependent on one another and in other cases divorced from a larger architectural complex the term villa exhibits mobility as the application of an idea to architecture In place of a fixed image is an architectural environment that embodies an ideal of living The form and organization of villa architecture depend upon literary descriptions provided by the authors of ancient Rome. Particularly, the writings of Columella (4–70 A.D.) in De re rustica (I.6.1–3) and Cato (234–149 B.C.) in De agricultura (I.4.1) elaborate on the features of their villas in the Campagna the villa enjoys from the natural setting restorative powers in opposition to the excesses of city life Horace (65–8 B.C.) extolled the simple virtues and pleasures of ancient villa life in his poetry (for example and letters unfurled in a setting that was distinctly different from the urban experience of Rome Relying on initial reconstructions by Vincenzo Scamozzi (1548–1616) later architects would turn to Pliny’s descriptions to imagine the spaces and experience of the ancient villa The Villa Recovered: Archaeological Studies in Renaissance ItalyThe architecture and landscape elements described by Pliny the Younger appear as part of the Roman tradition of the monumental Villa Adriana Originally built by Emperor Hadrian in the first century A.D the villa extends across an area of more than 300 acres as a villa-estate combining the functions of imperial rule (negotium) and courtly leisure (otium) the vast archaeological site was recovered in the fifteenth century and many architects—including Francesco di Giorgio Martini (1439–1501) 1512/13–1583)—excavated and recorded firsthand the details of Hadrian’s design while consulting descriptive passages of the emperor’s life at the villa from the text Historia Augusta the architect-antiquarian Ligorio employed sculptural remains of the Villa Adriana in the Vatican gardens and as architectural spolia in his design of the nearby Villa d’Este (begun 1560) Built as one of the most splendid garden ensembles in Renaissance Italy Ligorio’s design for Cardinal Ippolito II d’Este (1509–1572) remains celebrated for its festive waterworks and terraced gardens (1991.1073.145[4.3]) Like the descriptions of ancient villas consulted by Renaissance architects the Villa d’Este commands spectacular vistas over the Roman campagna from its position high in the hills of Tivoli above the Villa Adriana The Invention of the Villa: Renaissance Rome and FlorenceThe imagined grandeur of the ancient Roman villa-estate depended not only on written descriptions but developed from the rediscovery of painted frescoes on the walls of antique ruins The painter-architect Raphael (1483–1520) and his workshop reinterpreted the highly ornamental stucco details from their archaeological studies for the monumental Villa Madama in Rome (begun 1517) The painted and sculpted relief grotesques portray narratives from ancient authors and follow antique examples from the Villa Adriana and the Domus Aurea several architects—including Giacomo Barozzi da Vignola (1507–1573) and Giorgio Vasari (1511–1574)—created ornate surfaces within the courtyard and grotto at the retreat in suburban Rome known as the Villa Giulia (1551–53) their designs unified the architecture of the surface and landscape setting into a carefully arranged decorative whole replete with fantastic water displays (1991.1073.145[2.7]) and antique statues (1990.53.1); (1990.53.2) formed the stage for the grand theatrical entertainments of the day Noteworthy examples include the immense villa gardens on the Pincio and Gianiculum hills associated with the powerful families of Rome such as the Villa Pincian (now Villa Borghese the Villa Medici (1540/1574–77) (61.532.26[7]) and the Villa Doria Pamphilj (1644–52) on the Gianiculum Equally vast estates were laid out in the Alban hills outside Rome at Frascati including the Villa Aldobrandini (1598–1603) (1991.1073.145[2.5]) and the Villa Mondragone (1573–77) (1991.1073.145[2.18]) In and around Florence during the sixteenth century the Medici family developed a series of villas integrated with the garden setting such as the magnificently situated Villa Medici at Fiesole (1458–61) the inventive villa-park at Pratolino (now Villa Demidoff and the delightful Villa La Petraia (1575–90) (36.31.10[33]) with its central belvedere overlooking the Arno River valley who promoted the antique tradition of his practice in I quattro libri dell’architettura (1570) In Palladio’s design for the Villa Almerico four identical porticos with temple-fronts and broad rising staircases are arrayed symmetrically on perpendicular axes about a circular sala at the center of the building The villa is advantageously placed on a hilltop and controls the landscape by its visibility across the fields Palladio’s invention recalls the unusual combination of forms at the Villa Adriana as he crowns the building with a dome and invests the structure with its alternate identity which recognizes the ancient Roman example of the Pantheon The first revived design from Palladio’s text was likely Lord Burlington’s Chiswick House near London (1725–29) based on the published woodcuts and travelers’ observations of the Villa Rotonda (41.100.169[1.2.15]) On the European continent as well as on distant shores Palladianism replaced other ideas of the Roman villa the typology of his villa designs influenced Pieter Post’s (1608–1669) villa-palace Huis ten Bosch the Neo-Palladian vocabulary influenced Thomas Jefferson’s home and retreat outside of Charlottesville and informed the design of Drayton Hall (ca built at the center of a rice plantation on the banks of the Ashley River near Charleston The Kirtlington Park dining room (1742–48) combines various sources in the design including motifs after antique models (32.53.1) exuberant contemporary decorative flourishes in the wall decoration and the seventeenth-century Palladian pattern on the ceiling after a similar design by Inigo Jones the dignified Neoclassical dining room from Lansdowne House (1766–69) may have more in common with an ideal interior after Palladio (32.12) The archaeologically correct ornamentation of the hall especially the niches with antique sculpture resembles the published design for a Corinthian Hall from the pages of Giacomo Leoni’s English edition of Palladio’s treatise (1715) (41.100.169[1.2.28]) Vanessa Bezemer SellersIndependent Scholar Geoffrey TaylorDepartment of Drawings and Prints The Villa: Form and Ideology of Country Houses Andrea Palladio: The Architect in His Time Peck, Amelia, et al. Period Rooms in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1996. See on MetPublications “The Idea and Invention of the Villa.” In Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/villa/hd_villa.htm (October 2004) Though it has exploded many times throughout history one explosion in 1906 was particularly deadly According to The New York Times it spewed forth a 1,000-foot-tall jet of fire and smoke Huge rocks weighing one ton each were hurled from the volcano lava oozed from the volcano's mouth at a rate of 21 feet per minute  "The Grand Eruption of Vesuvius in 1906," (via The University Chicago Press) observes that Mount Vesuvius covered the town of Boscotrecase with 12 feet of lava Even for people who escaped the superheated lava by heading indoors the lava was dense enough to crush the walls of homes Lava also tends to be so hot that it doesn't always burn things like trees — it can be hot enough to make them instantly explode on contact Forced from their homes to find fresh air to breathe, some people congregated in churches, praying for the natural disaster to stop, reports The New York Times and rocks of all sizes spewed out of the volcano so people began carrying umbrellas to avoid getting hit by the molten debris there was so much ash and dust in the air during the 1906 explosion that it was hard to see anything Some residents from Boscotrecase ventured outside and got close to the lava while carrying a statue of St. Anne to pray for a miracle (per The New York Times). Towns like Somma and San Guiseppe fared the worst, as three feet of ash settled over every open surface, per "The Grand Eruption of Vesuvius in 1906." In particular, San Guiseppe was a site of numerous deaths. As the volcano started to erupt, people gathered in churches to pray, but the falling detritus crushed them to death in their places of worship. In one church roof collapse, 105 people were killed, while 90 were injured  as The National Centers for Environmental Information details the roof of an entire marketplace collapsed according to "The Grand Eruption of Vesuvius in 1906." And for citizens who had poorly constructed houses the volcano's eruption was a death sentence as the weight of accumulating ash forced the roofs to cave in The death count after this deadly April 1906 eruption amounted to 350 people One man from the town of Boscotrecase examined the volcano's crater a few days after the eruption — and he reported back that lightning seemed to be constantly striking the crater (per "The Grand Eruption of Vesuvius in 1906") making loud noises as often as every five to ten minutes The rumbling went on for days and days after the initial explosion 3 million people live in the towns surrounding Vesuvius making it one of the most potentially dangerous sites in Italy