Art & Culture

Huge tomb of Celtic prince unearthed in France: ‘Exceptional’ 2,500-year-old burial

“Huge tomb of Celtic prince unearthed in France:

‘Exceptional’ 2,500-year-old burial”

The tomb of an Iron Age Celtic prince has been unearthed in a small French town.

The ‘exceptional’ grave, crammed with Greek and possibly Etruscan artefacts, was discovered in a business zone on the outskirts of Lavau in France’s Champagne region.

The prince is buried with his chariot at the centre of a huge mound, 130 feet (40 metres) across, which has been dated to the 5th Century BC.

The biggest find at the site was a huge wine cauldron. Standing on the handles of the cauldron, is the Greek god Acheloos. The river deity is shown with horns, a beard, the ears of a bull and a triple mustache

A team from the National Archaeological Research Institute, Inrap has been excavating the site since October last year.

They recently dated it to the end of the First Iron Age – a period characterised by the widespread use of the metal.

Its discovery could shed light on Iron Age European trade, researchers say.

The 2,500-year-old burial mound has at its heart a 14 square metre burial chamber, not yet opened, of an ancient royal.

An Iron Age Celtic prince lay buried with his chariot at the center of this huge mound in the Champagne region of France, according to the country’s National Archaeological Research Institute (Inrap)

Eight lioness heads decorate the edge of the cauldron (right). Inside the cauldron, the archaeologists found a ceramic wine vessel, called oniochoe (left)

A team from the National Archaeological Research Institute, Inrap has been excavating the site since October last year. Pictured is part of the cauldron found

‘It is probably a local Celtic prince,’ Inrap president Dominique Garcia told journalists on a field visit.

WHAT WERE THE KEY FINDS?

The prince is buried with his chariot at the centre of a huge mound. His chamber has not yet been opened.

This biggest find was a large bronze-decorated cauldron that was used to store watered-down wine.

The cauldron has four circular handles decorated with bronze heads that depict the Greek god Acheloos.

Another interesting discovery was a perforated silver spoon that was part of the banquet utensils, presumably to filter the wine.

The mausoleum contained a decorated ceramic wine pitcher made by the Greeks.

The most exciting find, he said, was a large bronze-decorated cauldron that was used to store watered-down wine. It appears to have been made by Etruscan craftsmen from an area that is today in Italy.

The cauldron has four circular handles decorated with bronze heads that depict the Greek god Acheloos.

The river deity is shown with horns, a beard, the ears of a bull and a triple mustache.

Eight lioness heads decorate the edge of the cauldron.

The mausoleum contained a decorated ceramic wine pitcher made by the Greeks.

Decorations on the vessel reveal the god Dionysus, lying under a vine and facing a woman.

The archaeologists also found remains of a iron wheel, from a chariot buried with the prince.

Another interesting discovery was a perforated silver spoon that was part of the banquet utensils, presumably to filter the wine. . . . .

by Ellie Zolgfagharifard via “Daily Mail“
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Coming Exhibition: THE WONDERFUL LAND ARTISTS IN EAST PRUSSIA

“THE WONDERFUL LAND ARTISTS IN EAST PRUSSIA”

Who:

Lithuanian Art Museum

When: May 8, 2014 – May 8, 2016 (Hours Vary)

Where:

Lithuanian Art Museum
Liepu Str. 33, LT-92145
Klaipėda, Lithuania

More Information: Here

The Society of East Prussian Art Lovers’ Nidden was founded in 2009 in Klaipėda by a small group of ethnography and history lovers. The aim of Nidden is to search, collect and promote paintings from East Prussia that picturesquely portray the nature, history and inhabitants of this region.

Aleksandr Popov, the chair and an active member of the Society, has been collecting paintings related to East Prussia for almost a decade. To date the collection has nearly 1,000 works of fine art and graphic art by almost 300 painters. Nidden promotes and presents its collection to the public, and it also organizes exhibitions – with over ten held so far in Nida, Rusnė, Kaliningrad (Russian Federation), Klaipėda, Kaunas and Vilnius. The success of and public involvement in the exhibitions, and the information and experience gained while searching for new works served as encouragement for the Nidden Society to release an educational publication – The Journey to the Prussian Barbizon, based on Popov’s collection of paintings.

Members of the Nidden Society have drawn-up a list of painters: over 400 that created works in East Prussia. Popov’s collection is continually updated by paintings and graphic art works, and newly purchased items are awaiting research and revision of dates and authorship.

The fine art of East Prussia reflected many international cultural connections, interweaving many styles and trends of European art. Due to the complicated history of the region, many artists were forgotten, many works were lost, some became private property, and only a few ended up in museums. Thus Popov’s collection is valuable not only aesthetically, but also historically and educationally.

Over 100 artists are presented in the exhibition, and over 200 paintings and graphic art works are to be displayed. They were created in the 19th century and in the first half of the 20th century, during the blossoming of fine art in East Prussia, when the region was a centre of attraction for many painters.

These oil, tempera, water colour and pastel paintings, prints made using various graphic art techniques, drawings and reproductive prints represent the most significant phenomena of fine art history in East Prussia – the Königsberg Art Academy and the Artists’ Colony of Nida (Nidden), as well as the works of painters that were born, permanently lived or occasionally visited this region.

The exhibition is mainly composed of landscapes that depict the motives of various East Prussian locations (the coasts of the Semba peninsula, the Vistula lagoon, the Curonian Spit and others). These landscapes reveal the beauty of forests, fields, waters and dunes – sometimes severe, sometimes mysterious or remarkably explicit. In addition to the landscape works there are also figural compositions, still life works and portraits.

Artists from the 19th to the first half of the 20th century often changed their place of residence, and were not afraid of taking long journeys. The biographies of local and arrived artists feature cities and countries where the artists spent time learning, studying, holding exhibitions, and in the works we see motifs reminiscent of other countries, alongside images of East Prussia. The characteristic mobility of artists from this period, their exchange of ideas, and the recognition of new art styles contributed to the variety of East Prussian art and its popularity far beyond the country’s borders.

The spectrum of the styles of work in the exhibition is very wide: from Academism, sentimental Realism, late Impressionism, and Naturalism, to Expressionism and New Objectivity. Some works, created in the second half of the 20th century and which represent late Expressionism, reveal a phenomenon of East Prussian fine arts post-1945: unable to return to their beloved places, painters created paintings by memory, based on their impressions deep in their minds.

The eloquent works of this long term exhibition are in show in the gallery alongside the Pranas Domšaitis permanent collection of works, and allow us to gain a better understanding of the creative origins, influences and historical context of these painters hailing from Prussian Lithuania. Many of the artists presented in “The Wonderful Land” were contemporaries of P. Domšaitis: teachers, colleagues, friends who he studied with at the Königsberg Art Academy, painted with along the coasts of the Semba peninsula, visited the Curonian Spit, and discussed art, participating in exhibitions in Königsberg, and other cities of Germany and Europe.

Kristina Jokubavičienė

Man Buys 10.000 Undeveloped Negatives At a Local Auction and Discovers One of The Most Important Street Photographers of the Mid 20th Century

“Man Buys 10.000 Undeveloped Negatives At a Local Auction and Discovers One of The Most Important Street Photographers of the Mid 20th Century”

by Vivian Maier via “Weburger“

Imagine this : perhaps the most important street photographer of the twentieth century was a nanny who kept everything to herself. Nobody had ever seen her work and she was a complete unknown until the time of her death. For decades Vivian’s work hid in the shadows until decades later (in 2007), historical hobbyist John Maloof bought a box full of never developed negatives at a local auction for $380.

John began to develop the negatives and it didn’t take long before he realised that these were no ordinary street snapshots from the 50’s and 60’s — these pictures were a lot more then that. Maier’s work is particularly evocative for those who grew up in the 50′s and 60′s because she seemed to stare deep into the soul of the time and preserve the everyday experience of the people. She ventured outside the comfortable homes and picturesque residential neighborhoods of her employers to document all segments of life in and around the big city.

What the Sumerians did for art

“What the Sumerians did for art”

by P.W. via “The Economist“

GOLD-encrusted and splendid, Tutankhamun’s tomb changed perceptions of archaeology in Europe and the United States on its discovery by Howard Carter in 1922, and the resulting wave of Egyptomania influenced everything from fashion to furniture. “From Ancient to Modern: Archaeology and Aesthetics”, a new exhibition at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World (ISAW) in New York, explores the impact that the Tutankhamun hoard had on two near contemporaries of Carter, Leonard Woolley and Henri Frankfort, who worked on separate digs in what is now southern Iraq—as well as the public response to their finds.

The pieces that the English Woolley and the Dutch Frankfort uncovered were from the Sumerian civilisation (c.3100BC-2100BC) and helped change the public perception of ancient societies and artefacts. They included jewels and luxury goods at Ur (Woolley) and dozens of stone carvings from the nearby Diyala Valley (Frankfort).

Woolley’s team struck gold, literally and metaphorically, in 1927. A large cemetery was uncovered with 1,800 graves, including 16 that were said to be royal tombs, since they contained bodies ornamented with precious materials. The remains of Queen Puabi, buried with a retinue of murdered servants to ensure her care in the afterlife, became Woolley’s Tutankhamun. Her elaborate gold headdress, topped by a spectacular star-studded comb, was reconstructed by Woolley’s wife, as was the queen’s cloak of long strands of semiprecious stones. An imagined facsimile of the queen wearing this garb was soon on display at the British Museum.

The stone figures (pictured) found by Frankfort’s mission, which started work in 1930, depict men with huge eyes and bare chests. Their long skirts seem to have been made of feathers or leaves, though scholars now say the material was cotton tufts. From the first Frankfort referred to them as sculptures not artefacts. For him, as for thousands after, they were works of art.

Following Carter’s example, the two archaeologists sought to ensure maximum publicity for their finds, and were rewarded with some lurid news stories. “Evidence that the Queen of Ancient Ur was clubbed to Death,” screamed a 1928 piece in the Washington Herald. “Grim Tragedy of Wicked Queen Shubad’s 100 Poisoned Slaves,” ran a 1934 account in thePhiladelphia Inquirer. Agatha Christie’s 1935 mystery, “Murder in Mesopotamia”, was inspired by Woolley’s dig.

ISAW’s fascinating, tightly packed show has many jewels and ten of the stone figures, as well as contemporary archaeological records with detailed drawings and measurements, on-the-spot diaries and photographs of the teams. In a second room are works by 20th- and 21st-century artists who saw the stone carvings, among them Henry Moore and Alberto Giacometti. But this display, while attractive, is unpersuasive: an artist can see an object, even be captivated by it, without it having a lasting influence; yet such an influence is claimed. While the drawings Giacometti made in 1935 from Sumerian sculpture on view at the Louvre are of some interest, it was Etruscan art that more powerfully influenced his work. As for the cast-concrete Moore figure from 1929 that is on display, the fact that the work’s folded hands may owe something to the Sumerian statues does nothing to support the idea that Moore’s subsequent more celebrated sculpture was similarly influenced.

Islamic Coins Discovered in Viking’s Shield Boss

“Islamic Coins Discovered in Viking’s Shield Boss”

via “Archaeology.com“

Last year, a metal detectorist discovered a sword from the Viking Age in a field in central Norway. Archaeologists from the Museum of Natural History and Archaeology at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology excavated the site, and found a grave dating to about A.D. 950 that contained the remains of a Viking and his shield, in addition to the inscribed, high-quality sword. Hidden inside the shield boss they found a leather purse that contained several Islamic coins. Norwegian Vikings arrived in Spain in the 800s, where they may have come in contact with Islamic culture, or perhaps the coins were obtained through trade. “We have not managed to find out who owned the sword, but we know that he was a well-traveled man,” archaeologist Ingrid Ystgaard told NRK, as reported by ThorNews. The shield boss also bears combat scars. “The shield boss has a clear cut mark by an ax or a sword. If he died in combat, we do not know,” added Ystgaard. To read about the earliest Norse raids, see “The First Vikings.”