Consuming Greek Antiquity: Μαΐου 2011

Τρίτη 17 Μαΐου 2011

Ancient Greece in the East

Dimitris, a Grrek currently staying and working in China, is taking amazing photographs from his life in this foreign country. You may follow his photography HERE and HERE.

Dimitris was very generous to send me two of his photographs which serve as eloquent examples of consuming Greek antiquity in China.

A photo from Dimitris' gym - with Pegasus as its emblem.

This is from a cafe, and Dimitris suspects its portaying the well-known Archimedes in the bathroom incident.

Indeed one sees a nude guy wearing a Greek or Roman looking helmet enjoying his coffee. The moustache should tips the scales towards Greek!

Dimitris, thanks again very much for all this!

Τετάρτη 11 Μαΐου 2011

An appropriate Eurovision setting (or not)

Strange Ionian-looking Greek columns in the background for the Greek song in the Eurovision 2011 song contest in Germany.
There seems to be an emblem on the column capital but can't really make it out; something between an anthemium and two antithetic swans?

Τρίτη 3 Μαΐου 2011

A Japanese Smoking Pegasus?

Poster for the Japanese "Peacock" cigarettes (1902)

(But why didn't they choose a peacock? Or: why did they choose a Pegasus?)

What's this?

Consuming Greek Antiquity is an on-going project of mine aiming to explore the various ways through which Greek antiquity has been consumed by the 20th c. popular media, especially photography and graphic illustration.

I'm mainly interested in the most original and ingenious examples of incorporating and often interpreting elements of the ancient greek culture. Whole sites, monuments, artefacts, historical and mythological figures appear in the least expected places and these unexpected occurences and strange encounters are the main focus of this blog.

Having just written this, I need to stress that this is a more-fun-than-work project, rather than the other way round, so no strict criteria are applied, i.e. not only 20th c. and not only popular media, but I'll try to stick to only Greek antiquity.

Effort has been made to include attribution to the original sources of the works presented here, but apologies are offered in advance where I have failed.