Shaping Roman Landscape

Mantha Zarmakoupi, University of Pennsylvania
Shaping Roman Landscape

Abstract
Contemporary perceptions of the natural and built environment, as well as ideas about nature and art, were intertwined with the architectural and decorative trends of the Early Imperial period. In this presentation, I trace this process by examining ways in which the transformation of the natural and built environment and contemporary perceptions of it, as well as ideas about nature and art, related to the new architectural and decorative mannerisms of this period. I tackle the interrelation between real, visual, and virtual pictorial spaces in Roman villas, examining the ways in which the framing of painted and actual views of landscapes in Roman luxury villas moves between perceptual and conceptual space and transgresses traditional notions of pictoriality, and in so doing artializes the natural world into landscape in the Early Imperial period.