A Celtic-Roman Votive Offering (Art no.3) by sandra46
Close
Hover over top left image to zoom.
Click anywhere to exit.
Members remain the original copyright holder in all their materials here at Renderosity. Use of any of their material inconsistent with the terms and conditions set forth is prohibited and is considered an infringement of the copyrights of the respective holders unless specially stated otherwise.
Description
Votive offerings showing different parts of the body to offer to a god in the hope to prevail on him into bestowing his or her health powers on the offerer's body part (eyes, legs, arms, genitalia,etc.) to heal, are common all over the Egyptian, Greek, Etruscan and Roman world. They were often tossed into holy wells or springs. Penises were used, often with wings, as amulets or reproduced as offerings to the health gods. They were mass-produced, according to the different segments of the market, from those in clay, cheap and easily accessible to all, but cursorily manufactured, to those for the well-offs, carefully executed in bronze, like this one in the Gallo-Roman Museum in Lyon, France.
Penis amulets and bas reliefs were fairly common in the late Roman era, especially in the outlying regions of the Empire. Normally in votive offerings depicting the male genitals the penis is flacid, whereas erect phalluses regularly occur in representations having the power to prevent evil or bad luck, like charms. A votive erect phallus, however, was also a good votive offering in a sanctuary dedicated to Eros and Aphrodite.
The penis from the Gallo-Roman Lyon, at the time the capital city of Gaul as well as the birthplace of two emperors, sported important sanctuaries to Gallo-Roman gods. One of the most worshiped was the Sun god Apollo, whose names as the god of health mean The Healer, The Physician, and also The Restrainer or Averter of Evil. Apollo Belenus (bright or brilliant)was the name given to Apollo in parts of Gaul, North Italy and Noricum (part of modern Austria). Apollo Belenus was a healing and sun god, and with similar names he was known all over the Celtic-Roman world.
What is interesting in this bronze representation is that an item, which was manufactured in series with a mold, albeit for the upper echelon of the market, and whose fate was to disappear in a well or in a grave (to bring luck in the Underworld), has become an object of art. In fact, in the museum it's shown alone in a glasscase, as if it was a unique object. The relative rarity and the age of the object has transformed it from an object of consumption to be ritually lost, into an artistic creation to be preserved and consumed by the visitor's eyes.
For those who may be interested, I sent this image to the RR staff in advance and approved because, being a 'statue', is allowed by the TOS.
Thank you for your kind comments.
Comments (40)
Madbat
Sooo....viagra is nothing new then.
Darkwish
Nice idea, very well done.
SIGMAWORLD
Well done.
Richardphotos
very dramatic post work
Minda
beautiful art sandra.
Marinette
...in questo momento il mio cervellino si rifiuta di comprendere un qualche cosa che non sia quella di riposare; mi piace l'idea che sia un'immagine beneaugurante. Ne ho bisogno,grazie!:-)
tennesseecowgirl
You find the most interesting subjects... lol great work and interesting to read about.
MagikUnicorn
B E A U T Y
Chipka
I've seen quite a few of these votives on display in various museums throughout my museum going days...and needless to say, some of those ancient phalluses were...um...well...um...I guess pendulous would be the word: they needed wings just to help carry their weight! But anyway, enough about that. I love what you did with this image...the collage effect works perfectly, and the sense of color and texture is really incredibly nice. What I really like is the abstract quality of what's being shown...and the way the image as a whole reminds me of some of the best book cover art I've seen! I tend to like book cover art, especially from the 60s on through the early 90s, and there was a period when collages such as this graced the works of such authors as Sartre, Huxley, and more recently, Delany. So, yeah, visually, this has a real sort of resonance with me. I like this immensely. You have such an eye for things, especially in terms of composition and in terms of shifting reality just a bit: capturing an image or images and presenting them to us as if they are our own memories, fuzzed and shifted as memories will get fuzzy and shift, but still remain true to themselves and the experiences they mark. Fantastic!
anahata.c
lol, chip. "Pendulous". Never thought about it before...these phalluses would need wings, alright, given what they were made of. And I agree with chip about the collage: It has a fresh mythical feel to it, from those "shifting realities" as if they were our own "memories & dreams"...But your image is also very concrete: It looks like something carved/forged out of metal, a kind of metal bas relief, as if this were a panel made at the entry hall of the museum in the ancient world which displayed these offerings. (The imaginary museum in the ancient world...) It's a very creative montage, and your high-key lighting against that metallic surface makes it feel like a tribute to all the votives you speak about. And your pink panel reminds me of an illustration in an old biology text---one of those old illustrations that were used when photographs weren't common. A fine image once again, Sandra. And the idea that we've taken these once somewhat-common items and made them objects of rarity---which they are, from all you write---and displayed them in the sterile environments of the modern gallery, makes your point about art & display all over again. I'll tell you a story: When I was doing a thesis on "The Interrelation of the Arts" (modest topic), one of my grad school neighbors left me a piece of mail he'd received by mistake. He left it at my door, framed in a cheap frame, with the title: "Epistle in Glass Frame, 1978". I wrote a plaque for it and left it at his door, saying, "Epistle in Glass Frame, 1978, created in 842 BCE, to look like a projected future-society's mode of letter-writing. Remarkably accurate. Part of a series..." He, in turn, left me the same, with the letter opened, saying, "Opened by a merchant in 17th C. Amsterdam. From the pigment drawn on the flap, most likely early 17th C." (He'd painted a little sepia on the envelope-flap.) Another friend gathered all the pieces and laid them in a pile of rubble & sprinkled dirt on them & photographed the whole lot, calling it, "New Find in cornfield site outside Chicago suburbs: The ancient world contemplates future modes of communication. We believe there are more of these." The photograph was then ripped---by me---burnt on the edges, soiled and stomped on, and called, "Reproduction of unknown 20th C. artist, probably from the U.S. Midwest: We don't know the artist's intent, but it was presumably connected with the ritual of tearing letters as a way of expelling spirits gathered in said letters' transit..." And so on & so forth. Not riotously funny, but it was fun nevertheless, lol. Point is, you've made a strange new piece of art out of these votives, which had very specific functions to the world in which they were made. And now we stare at them, an age removed, for their strange forms, shapes, and the lighting & textures you gave to them, and are reminded that the museum that displayed these also "extracted" them from their original purpose, all while you extracted the museum display as well. Does the original intent remain? I think so, if in an unconscious way. Is there any way we look at these phaluses and not see some ritual of power, transcendence, incantation, etc? Even in your transformation of them, you invested them with a light they probably were intended to have. It's just that they've been repackaged by history & time, and so reclothed for the era they're now in. Transformation with basic human desire at its base. (Desire for healing, empowerment, transcendence, etc.) Another fine entry, Sandra, well visualized once more & explained...