McCullin has turned his attention from a fascination with the ruined cities of the Empire—exposed in big, broad landscapes under metallic skies—to the still and intimate close-ups of stone sculpture. For this collection of images, all created in the past three years, McCullin photographed after-hours, or before doors open to the public, in the museums. The statues, released from their context—time and place—are captured in black and white and in the hush and tranquillity of a space devoid of crowds. They are re-animated by McCullin’s gaze and through his lens.
‘It is never as an academic, nor as a scholar, that I respond to these stone gods and goddesses, but as a respectful admirer. I hope to pay tribute, through my photography, to their iconic beauty, their marble perfection and their very existence, exhumed lovingly by archaeologists and brought to life after 2000 years of burial. We must not allow ourselves to forget that such beauty came at a price; this, after all was stone quarried by enslaved people and the statuary itself became the spoils of war, looted across the centuries, from country to country, to this day. It moves me that these exhibits have existed through such turbulent times and turmoil; surviving disfigurement and the changing mores and morality of Christianity and Islam which found nudity unsettling, surviving the vandalism of thieves and tomb-robbers, the destruction of earthquakes, as well the zeal of over-enthusiastic restorers. Their broken beauty doesn’t take away from their impact; here is all the power and the glory of the Roman world at its most narcissistic and idealised; a celebration of victory, grandeur and perfection of the gods and heroes of the classical world.‘–Don McCullin
The genesis of the project occurred in 1974 with a chance visit to the ruins of the Romano-Berber hilltop town of Tiddis with writer Bruce Chatwin after an assignment to Algeria. Inspired by that day, many years later, McCullin returned to photograph the Roman ruins of North Africa. More recently, McCullin has collaborated and travelled with, and been guided by historian and author Barnaby Rogerson—whom he credits with his increased desire for further knowledge.
‘The statues of the gods and semi-divine heroes were often designed to be mobile, not frozen at some agreeable angle in a well-lit museum alcove, for they moved around to an annual calendar, including processions when they were surrounded by dancers, scent and music—not fenced off by the careful scholarship of professional curators.’ –Barnaby Rogerson
‘I confess, however, I often feel that, after dark, when the lights go out or before the doors open to the public, these statues, mortals and heroes of Roman myth and legend, are as though buried again. They come to life only under our—the public’s—admiring gaze. My hope is that this book is another way of keeping them alive.’ – Don McCullin
