Half-naked women reclining in men’s arms with a lush backdrop. Couples gazing with yearning into each other’s eyes. No, these are not descriptions from the latest period romance novel. They are scenes from San Diego artist and UCSD Emeritus Faculty Eleanor Antin’s large-scale photographs titled “The Last Days of Pompeii”, currently being showcased at UCSD’s University Art Gallery. Stunning both in size and technique, these twelve photographs are reminiscent of Baroque and Renaissance art.
For over 30 years, Antin has made a career of storytelling in films, photographs and performance, and her feminist-themed work has made her a prominent artist in the contemporary art world. While Antin’s work continues to be shown in Los Angeles, New York and Europe, “The Last Days of Pompeii” represents the first time her work will be exhibited in her hometown since a 1977 exhibition at the La Jolla Museum of Art (now the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego).
Walking into University Art Gallery, the sheer size of the 12 photographs draws the viewer in. Antin’s “Last Days” evokes narratives of a sensually decadent Roman Empire. The photographs’ natural settings and figure placements remind one of 16th and 17th century European paintings, though Antin has skillfully added elements of modernity to them. Described by Art In America critic Eleanor Heartney as a “playful homage both to the extravagances of 19th century salon paintings and to the Hollywood costume dramas inspired by the story of Rome in decline,” Antin’s photographs are beautiful and elaborately staged.
In her depiction of Pompeii, gladiators fight to the death at a sumptuous banquet; a young girl languorously bathes in a garden pool spied on by gray-haired senators; the writer Petronious celebrates his suicide with an orgy of friends and lovers; and greedy aristocrats revel in and then are asphyxiated by piles of golden coins. The resulting series of chromogenic prints are both luscious in their visceral appeal and beguiling for their multiple levels of interpretation. Giving us a slice of history preserved in time, Antin presents a self-indulgent, self-absorbed society ignoring the warnings of imminent catastrophe. However, she leaves explicit contemporary parallels to the viewer’s imagination.
Antin shot these photographs in the San Diego area by transforming parts of the UCSD campus and the Rancho Santa Fe home of fellow faculty member, Marianne McDonald, into a Roman villa. Antin also enlisted the participation of fellow UCSD faculty colleagues Sheldon Nodelman, Newton Harrison and Bennett Berger as actors in her production. Well-known artist’s models from the area, along with students from UCSD’s theater and visual arts departments, joined the visual spectacle as actors and set- builders. All the hard work culminate in her show at University Art Gallery.
In an effort to shed light on her process, the gallery will also screen Antin’s rough video footage shot during the making of “The Last Days of Pompeii” and a feature on her work produced by the show “Art: 21 – Art in the Twenty-First Century,” which was broadcast nationally on PBS in 2003. Her exhibit will be in display from April 17 to June 12. The gallery is free for everyone and open Tuesdays through Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.
