Michael Squire – författare

The Tabulae Iliacae (Iliac tablets) are a collection of twenty-two miniature marble reliefs from the early Roman Empire; all of them are inscribed in Greek, and most depict the panoramic vistas of Greek Epic. This book brings the tablets to life as never before, revealing the unassuming fragments as among the most sophisticated objects to survive from the ancient Mediterranean world. The Iliad in a Nutshell is not only the first monograph on this material in English (accompanied by a host of new photographs, diagrams, and reconstructions), it also examines the larger cultural and intellectual stakes--both in classical antiquity and beyond.Where modern scholars have usually dismissed the Tabulae Iliacae as secondary 'illustrations' and 'tawdry gewgaws', Michael Squire advances a diametrically opposite thesis: that these epigrammatic tablets synthesize ancient ideas about visual-verbal interaction on the one-hand, and about the art and poetics of scale on the other. By reassessing the artistic and poetic aesthetics of the miniature, Squire's radical new appraisal shows how the tiny tablets encapsulate antiquity's grandest theories of originality, fiction, and replication. The book will be essential reading not just for classical philologists, art historians, and archaeologists, but for anyone interested in the intellectual history of western representation.

Gotthold Ephraim Lessing first published Laokoon, oder über die Grenzen der Mahlerey und Poesie (Laocoon, or on the Limits of Painting and Poetry) in 1766. Over the last 250 years, Lessing's essay has exerted an incalculable influence on western critical thinking. Not only has it directed the history of post-Enlightenment aesthetics, it has also shaped the very practices of 'poetry' and 'painting' in a myriad of different ways. In this anthology of specially commissioned chapters - comprising the first ever edited book on the Laocoon in English - a range of leading critical voices has been brought together to reassess Lessing's essay on its 250th anniversary. Combining perspectives from multiple disciplines (including classics, intellectual history, philosophy, aesthetics, media studies, comparative literature, and art history), the book explores the Laocoon from a plethora of critical angles. Chapters discuss Lessing's interpretation of ancient art and poetry, the cultural backdrops of the eighteenth century, and the validity of the Laocoon's observations in the fields of aesthetics, semiotics, and philosophy. The volume shows how the Laocoon exploits Greek and Roman models to sketch the proper spatial and temporal 'limits' (Grenzen) of what Lessing called 'poetry' and 'painting'; at the same time it demonstrates how Lessing's essay is embedded within Enlightenment theories of art, perception, and historical interpretation, as well as within nascent eighteenth-century ideas about the 'scientific' study of Classical antiquity (Altertumswissenschaft). To engage critically with the Laocoon, and to make sense of its legacy over the last 250 years, consequently involves excavating various 'classical presences': by looking back to the Graeco-Roman past, the volume demonstrates, Lessing forged a whole new tradition of modern aesthetics.

The Iliad in a Nutshell has two objectives: first, it advances a new critical interpretation of the miniature Iliac tablets, or Tabulae Iliacae; second, it signals their relevance within much bigger issues facing the study of Graeco-Roman art and literature in the twenty-first century. By re-assessing the visual and verbal aesthetics of the miniature, Michael Squire shows how a group of early Imperial Roman objects relate to grander discourses about size, ecphrasis, and representation. The conclusions will be of critical importance not only to students of Graeco-Roman literary and visual culture, but to anyone interested in the cultural history of scale, replication, and visual-verbal relations. The volume is generously illustrated, in both black and white and colour.

The relation between the visual and the verbal spheres has been much contested in recent years, from laments about the 'logocentricism' of the academy to the heralding of the 'pictorial turn' of the multimedia age. This lavishly illustrated book recontextualises these debates through the historical lens of Greek and Roman antiquity. Dr Squire shows how modern Western concepts of 'words' and 'pictures' derive from a post-Reformation tradition of theology and aesthetics. Where modern critics assume a bipartite separation between images and texts, classical antiquity toyed with a more playful and engaged relation between the two. By using the ancient world to rethink our own ideologies of the visual and the verbal, this interdisciplinary book brings together classics and art history, as well as a sustained reflection on their historiography: the result is a new and explosive cultural history of Western visual thinking.

How should we talk about material objects, especially the virtual two-dimensional impressions of painting? A particularly sophisticated answer is provided by Philostratus' Imagines, one of the world's earliest and greatest works of art criticism. Jaś Elsner and Michael Squire situate this Imperial Greek text in its various 'Second Sophistic' contexts, especially in relation to Graeco-Roman traditions of image-making, aesthetics, rhetoric and the evocation of visual impressions (so-called 'ecphrasis'). They also champion its extraordinarily rich significance for anyone interested in perception, subjective imagination and the emotional leverage of art. If the Imagines remains unsurpassed as one of the western tradition's most creatively original, scintillating and self-reflexive works of art criticism, Elsner and Squire argue, its relevance is also pressingly contemporary: there are modern lessons to be learnt from this ancient project of educating the young - lessons that have a particular urgency in our own dawning digital age.

The frames of classical art are often seen as marginal to the images that they surround. Traditional art history has tended to view framing devices as supplementary 'ornaments'. Likewise, classical archaeologists have often treated them as tools for taxonomic analysis. This book not only argues for the integral role of framing within Graeco-Roman art, but also explores the relationship between the frames of classical antiquity and those of more modern art and aesthetics. Contributors combine close formal analysis with more theoretical approaches: chapters examine framing devices across multiple media (including vase and fresco painting, relief and free-standing sculpture, mosaics, manuscripts and inscriptions), structuring analysis around the themes of 'framing pictorial space', 'framing bodies', 'framing the sacred' and 'framing texts'. The result is a new cultural history of framing - one that probes the sophisticated and playful ways in which frames could support, delimit, shape and even interrogate the images contained within.

The relation between the visual and the verbal spheres has been much contested in recent years, from laments about the 'logocentricism' of the academy to the heralding of the 'pictorial turn' of the multimedia age. This lavishly illustrated book recontextualises these debates through the historical lens of Greek and Roman antiquity. Dr Squire shows how modern Western concepts of 'words' and 'pictures' derive from a post-Reformation tradition of theology and aesthetics. Where modern critics assume a bipartite separation between images and texts, classical antiquity toyed with a more playful and engaged relation between the two. By using the ancient world to rethink our own ideologies of the visual and the verbal, this interdisciplinary book brings together classics and art history, as well as a sustained reflection on their historiography: the result is a new and explosive cultural history of Western visual thinking.

The frames of classical art are often seen as marginal to the images that they surround. Traditional art history has tended to view framing devices as supplementary 'ornaments'. Likewise, classical archaeologists have often treated them as tools for taxonomic analysis. This book not only argues for the integral role of framing within Graeco-Roman art, but also explores the relationship between the frames of classical antiquity and those of more modern art and aesthetics. Contributors combine close formal analysis with more theoretical approaches: chapters examine framing devices across multiple media (including vase and fresco painting, relief and free-standing sculpture, mosaics, manuscripts and inscriptions), structuring analysis around the themes of 'framing pictorial space', 'framing bodies', 'framing the sacred' and 'framing texts'. The result is a new cultural history of framing - one that probes the sophisticated and playful ways in which frames could support, delimit, shape and even interrogate the images contained within.

It is to Greek critical thinking about seeing that we owe our conceptual framework for theorizing the senses, and it is also to such thinking that we owe the lasting legacy of Greco-Roman imagery. Sight and the Ancient Senses is the first thorough introduction to the conceptualization of sight in the history, visual culture, literature and philosophy of classical antiquity. Examining how the Greeks and Romans interpreted what they saw, the collection also considers sight in relation to the other senses. This volume brings together a number of interdisciplinary perspectives to deliver a broad and balanced coverage of this subject. Contributors explore the cultural, social and intellectual backdrops that gave rise to ancient theories of seeing, from Archaic Greece through to the advent of Christianity in late antiquity. This series of specially commissioned thematic chapters demonstrate how theories about sight informed Graeco-Roman philosophy, science, poetry rhetoric and art. The collection also reaches beyond its Graeco-Roman visual framework, showcasing how ancient ideas have influenced the longue durée of western sensory thinking. Richly illustrated throughout, including a section of color plates, Sight and the Ancient Senses is a wide-ranging introduction to ancient theories of seeing which will be an invaluable resource for students and scholars of classical antiquity.

It is to Greek critical thinking about seeing that we owe our conceptual framework for theorizing the senses, and it is also to such thinking that we owe the lasting legacy of Greco-Roman imagery. Sight and the Ancient Senses is the first thorough introduction to the conceptualization of sight in the history, visual culture, literature and philosophy of classical antiquity. Examining how the Greeks and Romans interpreted what they saw, the collection also considers sight in relation to the other senses. This volume brings together a number of interdisciplinary perspectives to deliver a broad and balanced coverage of this subject. Contributors explore the cultural, social and intellectual backdrops that gave rise to ancient theories of seeing, from Archaic Greece through to the advent of Christianity in late antiquity. This series of specially commissioned thematic chapters demonstrate how theories about sight informed Graeco-Roman philosophy, science, poetry rhetoric and art. The collection also reaches beyond its Graeco-Roman visual framework, showcasing how ancient ideas have influenced the longue durée of western sensory thinking. Richly illustrated throughout, including a section of color plates, Sight and the Ancient Senses is a wide-ranging introduction to ancient theories of seeing which will be an invaluable resource for students and scholars of classical antiquity.

The art of the human body is arguably the most important and wide-ranging legacy bequeathed to us by Classical antiquity. Not only has it directed the course of western image-making, it has shaped our collective cultural imaginary - as ideal, antitype, and point of departure. This book is the first concerted attempt to grapple with that legacy: it explores the complex relationship between Graeco-Roman images of the body and subsequent western engagements with them, from the Byzantine icon to Venice Beach (and back again). Instead of approaching his material chronologically, Michael Squire faces up to its inherent modernity. Writing in a lively and accessible style, and supplementing his text with a rich array of pictures, he shows how Graeco-Roman images inhabit our world as if they were our own. The Art of the Body offers a series of comparative and thematic accounts, demonstrating the range of cultural ideas and anxieties that were explored through the figure of the body both in antiquity and in the various cultural landscapes that came afterwards.If we only strip down our aesthetic investment in the corpus of Graeco-Roman imagery, Squire argues, this material can shed light on both ancient and modern thinking. The result is a stimulating process of mutual illumination - and an exhilarating new approach to Classical art history.