We are excited to share Erin Bello’s video lecture, “Reexamining the Visual Impact of the Togate Body: Deviations and Codified Representations.”
Erin Bello received her Bachelors degrees in both Art History and Classical Civilizations from the University of North Carolina at Asheville. She then attended John Cabot University for her Masters in Rome where her research focused on Roman statuary. She returned to Italy again to attend the certification program for the Association for Research into Crimes against Art and is currently studying underwater cultural heritage crimes across the Mediterranean.
This presentation explores how the toga was depicted in Roman art, and what it represented.
Erin provided us with the following abstract:
“The ideal of the gens togata has framed scholarship around statuary and reliefs of the togate statue body and has served to eliminate the narrative beyond a codification of symbols as indication of status and achievements. The visual dialogue of the togate consists of the juxtaposition and tension between the face and body, male and female depictions, and between other togate statue bodies. The authority of the statue relies on the object’s reception among others of similar appearance while maintaining a sense of personalization, communicating through the expectation of the viewers in a public space. Through an expanding examination of the togate statue body as means of an actual garment, an object, an ideal, and a codified language in of itself, this paper seeks to examine the visual impact of these statue types among themselves and the public landscape of the Roman world.”
Erin has not asked us to share any content warnings with our audience.
All About The Ancient World 