In the way in which decorative and narrative reliefs are represented in buildings in ancient Rome, it can be seen that they constitute Roman historical stories made of stone. These reliefs provide significant information on many aspects related to social, religious, political, military and economic life of this city and the conquered regions. Rome became the center of a great empire that brought together different cultures under its military power and cultural influence so they also apply the technique of relief in their territories; As they did anonymous artisans in Rome to decorate architectural structures such as monuments, commemorative columns and funeral pantheons.
Mainly these chronic reliefs were made with the aim of decorating the walls of the monuments and sarcophagi but for this they left captured with thorough detail important historical facts and commemorative events representing scenes that show everyday facts through annecdotes that have accentuated realism and detail. Important government figures and their families, as well as simple citizens are represented in these scenes that are as stone portraits of these people detained at a certain moment of the action in which they are found.
The Roman sculpture during the first century of our era develops far from idealism and produced a series of important large -scale plastic works, such as the arches of Tito and Trajan, the columns of Trajan and Marcus aurelius whose reliefs stand out for the detail and realism they have and constitute true masterpieces.
Main elements in chronic relief in Roman sculpture:
– Care is observed in the representation of the natural fall of the folds.
– Seren expressions in the faces and in the attitude of the portrayed.
– Gestures, gestures and postures reinforce communication with the viewer depending on the scene and the purpose they want to achieve.
– The legs and arms as well as the direction of the head support the representation of the dynamics of the scene for example: those that are advancing in the procession, speaking or reaching something.
– They provide visual aspects of their clothing, social status, rituals, gods that venerate, mythological heroes, musical instruments and other elements.
– These reliefs add the narrative and didactic function to the decorative.
– They are anonymous, made by different stone sculptors whose artisanal work is commissioned by the client, so they must follow specific guidelines and requirements.
– The ductility of the stone allowed these artists to print in stone important moments in history that have remained for posterity thanks to their durability.
– They use perspective in reliefs with the intention of achieving depth.
The admiration of the Roman high classes towards the Hellenistic plastic arts and the fact that many Greek sculptors were working in Rome supported the influence that the Greek plastic had in the Italic Peninsula, this was considered as a beauty model and proliferated in Rome copies of works thanks to what was possible to know the work of the classic artists.
The interest of representing important events, heroic epic, staging with mythological figures and gods were in perfect according to the pride of the Romans as a nation, their power and their need to use any possible means to effectively perform the propaganda work that supported the actions of conquest, domain and overwhelming on numerous nations and different cultures. Chronic portraits and reliefs were also made to satisfy practical use of decoration, tribute, commemorative, banality or personal ambition.
Therefore every detail of the scenes has been planned with a thorough prior dissertation; Nothing is left by chance although they are very natural and realistic in them nothing is improvised. Each gesture, character and size of the scene in relation to the set respond to a carefully calculated project. For the Romans, it was important to represent realism in the works of art and the sculptor’s mission for them is not representing only beauty but to reproduce nature and reality as well. Faced with the classic Greek abstraction of perfect characters, the Romans preferred the representation of real -life people, portraying them with their personal characteristics, even if they were not well similar.
Keep in mind that these chronic reliefs; As we said, not only to communicate through an excellent propaganda work their message to society, but also to honor their gods. They were also a vehicle of communication with the divinities they adored and the means of doing so in the stone guaranteed that these stone offerings would content the gods and last eternally being at the height of what in their eyes these divinities deserved.
As every message tries to get the same as clearly as possible. Through these Chronic reliefs in Rome in antiquity It is possible to carry the main purpose of communication, carefully managing each of the artistic elements that are represented, those that although they are subordinated to the principles of the narrative and their dynamics in the plastic do not stop representing the personal imprint of the Italic nation and the purposes of the empire.