Lawrence Alma-Tadema and the nineteenth-century 'periode eye': Classical sources for his Entrance of the theatre (1866) and An exedra (1869)

Abstract

The Anglo-Dutch artist Lawrence Alma-Tadema (1836-1912) is known for being one of the leading representatives of historical genre painting. His paintings are often set in antiquity that usually transmits a peaceful atmosphere, although they also regularly refer to classical sources that include critical messages. Two key works of Alma-Tadema’s Pompeian period are Entrance of the theatre (1866) and An exedra (1869). These works are paradigmatic of the artist’s in-depth knowledge of classical civilization. He seemed obsessed with the historical accuracy of his paintings, which can be partly explained by the fact that general education at the time was steeped in the classics, and the public’s appreciation of his paintings must have been directly related to what was taught at school. Through a detailed analysis in conjunction with contemporary critical reviews, the author intends to reconstruct the nineteenth-century perspective on Alma-Tadema’s work. The question is how his contemporaries may have viewed his paintings, and how the concept of the ‘period eye’, developed by Baxandall, can be of use. It turns out that, with access to these classical sources, Entrance of the theatre becomes a scathing critique of the vanity and conceit of the wealthy class. Alma-Tadema’s reference to Terence’s comedy Andria convincingly complements a social criticism depicted through a public scene at the entrance of the Small Theatre in Pompeii. Additionally, the inscriptions and monuments that were associated with the famous family of the Holconians in particular, and theatrical patronage in Pompeii in general, must have been of particular interest to Alma-Tadema. This also emerged in An exedra, a scene around a tomb at the Via dei Sepolcri in Pompeii. The result is an image that, beyond a casual daily image from antiquity, also aims to show social injustice through the lost gaze of the enslaved person. These paintings show how Lawrence Alma-Tadema was capable of making numerous references, by layering several meanings and suggestions taken from antiquity. They also constitute a clear example of how he used and combined all his knowledge of classical architecture and fashion available at the time, to elaborate a pictorial narrative that pointed to the core of historical reconstruction.