Sculpture || Architecture || Wall Paintings

Sculpture
Unlike the Greeks, the Romans preferred Verism to Idealism.  Verism is the realistic portrayal of actual people.  The Greeks during the Classical period focused primarily on athletes and gods, showing them in idealistic bodies (even as they are fighting or dying).  The Romans however, preferred to show their senators with wrinkles, baldness, and pot-bellies.  To the Romans, age showed wisdom, and thus many politicians preferred to be depicted as old and wise.

The Romans also made death masks.  That is, they put wax over the face of someone who just died to make a bust of. Romans practiced ancestor worship with these death masks.

That is not to say the Romans did not like Greek sculpture.  Most of our knowledge of Greek statues comes from Roman replicas.  The Greeks preferred to work in bronze so most of their statues were melted down over the centuries.  The Romans preferred marble, so many of their sculptures survive. This statue of Genetrix for example is only known in its Roman copies.

 

Architecture

The Romans were the inventors of concrete, a cheap solid building material.  It was harder than the terra cotta used by the Etruscans, and less expensive than the marble used by the Greeks.  They used much of concrete in their construction.  Concrete, however, is not as attractive as marble in appearance so the Romans often constructed a building in concrete and then put a marble facade over it.

The Romans were also the inventors of the dome and made exclusive use of arches.  The Greeks knew about the arch but never used it in their construction.  The Romans utilized the arch in their aqueducts throughout the Roman Empire, as well as the famous Colosseum.  The dome is used in the Pantheon.  To lighten the weight of the dome itself, the ceiling is coffered.  There is an oculus on the top of the Pantheon which opens to the sky.  The ground is slightly elevated so the rain would not gather in the center.  It is quite an architectural feat.

In terms of temples, the Romans combined the influences of both the Greeks and the Etruscans.  Unlike the Greeks, the Romans temples can only be entered in one side, like the Etruscan temples.  However, in both Greek and Roman temples, only one deity is worshipped, where as there are three deities in an Etruscan temple.

 

The best example of the Roman combining Greek and Etruscan is the engaged columns.  The Greek temple is surrounded by a peristyle (columns on all four sides), while the Etruscan temples only have columns in the front.  In some Roman temples, actual columns (those that gives structural support) are placed in the front while engaged columns surround the rest of the temple. The Romans preferred Corinthian columns instead of the Doric columns which the Greeks liked better. The Greeks thought the Corinthian columns were too feminine.

Wall Painting

Because of volcanic ashes sealed off air, much of the wall paintings remain in Pompeii.  In the Odyssey Landscapes, we see one of the first examples of continuous narratives.  The Greeks sometimes used narratives on their friezes, but you will never see the same person on the same panel.  Continuous Narrative on the other hand shows the same person on several different panels (like a comic book).  Another place that uses this form of narrative is in the Villa of Mysteries, where a Bacchi/Dionysis (god of wine) initiation ceremony is taking place.  In this scene, although the initiate is seen over and over, your eyes only allow you to see one of her images at a time.

Romans also used wall painting to make their rooms seem more spacious.  Their painting shows beginnings of perspectives, but they have not perfected it