Ageless Expression: Eros Sleeping, Essay Example

Introduction

My recent visit to the Metropolitan Museum of Art was not my first to a museum, but it was one taken with a different approach.  Rather than seek to view a specific work or exhibit, or take in the offerings with no expectations, here I entered with a determination to take in the environment itself.  The art was a priority, and my focus was on ancient Greek and Roman statuary; at the same time, I wanted as well to take in the experience and atmosphere itself.  This proved more rewarding than I had anticipated.  I was captivated by a single work and spent a great deal of time around it, as I also felt a stronger sense of the purpose and meaning of the place itself.  Ultimately, I came away from the Metropolitan with a far deeper appreciation for classic Greek sculpture, as well as varied insights into what museums seem to mean to visitors.

Eros, Myself, and the Modern Public

To begin  with, I suspect that many people forget that the nature of a museum itself dictates feeling or reaction.  More exactly, and based on my experience, there is a vast difference between entering a museum as massive and magnificent as the Metropolitan, and more modern, spare museum spaces.  As soon as the Metropolitan is entered, there is an overwhelming sense of grandeur.  The feeling is that the art within is being honored by the beautiful rooms and settings holding it, and this somehow elevates the importance of the visit.  I would say, in fact, that this power affected even those I saw around me dressed and acting very casually.  I could discern that voices were hushed and respectful because the atmosphere in this place generates respect automatically, if not a subdued kind of reverence.  This was certainly the feeling created in me, as I moved from gallery to gallery.

In Gallery 164, I found myself repeatedly drawn to one work, the Bronze Statue of Eros Sleeping.  It is identified as from the Hellenistic or Augustan Period, and dated as from the 3^rd century BCE to the beginning of the Christian Era.  It is not imposing in size, measuring only thirty-three inches, and yet it commanded my interest far more than the larger, more “active” works in the same space.  After I took in the minimal information regarding it available, I drew near and found myself considering a wide range of impressions.  The first, I confess, was not favorable in terms of this being a true work of art.  The passivity and size of the Eros combined to make me see it as a more decorative piece, possibly intended as an ornament in a garden.  This may well have been the case; it seems that the ancient Greeks took advantage of the fact that casting in bronze inherently creates “reproductions,” as the cast reproduces the original from which it is molded.  This allowed the Greeks to make good commercial use of the art at hand, replicating classic forms to provide decorative accents to the homes of the wealthy (Mattusch  1).

At the same time, there was a clarity to this smaller bronze that captivated me.  It is both extremely simple and strangely complex, in that the smooth contours of the young god are so naturally shaped, and so exactly like that of a plump child.  I liked as well, and very much, the strikingly natural quality of the pose. It is almost sloppy, just as a child actually does sleep.

That the child is a god, then, added dimension to the ordinariness of the posture on the base.  It occurred to me that only the wings defined it as a god, and I wondered if other bronzes of this mold were perhaps wingless, to appeal to different markets of the era.  As I was thinking this, an older woman near me actually said something to the same effect, remarking on the Greek tendency to so humanize the deities.  This dozing boy held my attention for quite some time, and I found myself seriously reflecting on exactly what this very passive form was all about.  Eros in Greek myth and belief was an interestingly dual figure.  He was depicted either as a lusty, athletic young man or as a little boy, usually with small wings and his quiver of arrows (Littleton  488).  He is also given various origins. The bronze I viewed clearly depicts the son of Aphrodite, yet Eros is also one of the oldest gods known in Greek mythology, springing as a primal force from Chaos (Westmoreland  92).  To modern minds, certainly, the idea of eros itself is hardly inactive.  We associate love and sexuality with energy, and with forceful desire.  It then struck me that the Greeks were saying something extremely profound, and not a little disturbing, through this sculpted boy in bronze.  His mouth is open in sleep, as an arm dangles to the side.  He is, like any human child dozing, completely inert and seemingly in another world, and there is even a sense that the arm tucked below the body will wake him when it becomes uncomfortable.  This same boy, however, is a primal force in human affairs, so this presentation of him as inert adds all the more gravity to his power.  As I stared at this statue, it came to me that the Greeks, even if this was intended as nothing more than a pool decoration, had an understanding of innate humanity that is almost frightening.  In my eyes, they are revealing a truth, in that the most elemental forces rest as we do, but they are nonetheless still with us all the time.

I was glad, also, that I was free to engage in my speculations almost completely undisturbed.  The older woman aside, there were very few visitors to Gallery 164, and many who entered in that hour quickly moved on.  I am tempted to say that they were probably seeking more modern and “energetic” work, as in the display of Expressionist paintings commanding attention.  I also think statuary tends to generate less artistic interest from viewers of art, ironically because it is so dimensional.  In a sense, it does the viewer’s job for them, adding the shape of life to the art.  For me, however, this more comfortable feeling creates a greater sense of intimacy with the art, and I came away from the Bronze Eros feeling as though I had come to know a living being.

Conclusion

If I have learned anything from visiting museums, it is that art truly is subjective, and in the deepest sense.  I think people go with expectations of being influenced in certain ways, but this defeats the purpose of art.  I feel this more strongly after “spending time” with an Eros from thousands of years ago.  In my mind, he has very little to actually say.  He is, again, all passivity.  It is in that passivity, however, that the art exists, because it demands that I meet and fulfill the experience.  No matter exactly how the Greeks – or Romans – intended the work to exist, it performs several functions  simultaneously, and of immensely powerful effect.  This small statue merely presents a form of human life, imbues it with the power of a god, and leaves it there to sleep.  The implications, then, are as great as all human possibilities, and this is why I was so transfixed by the Bronze Statue of Eros Sleeping.

Works Cited

Littleton, C. S.  Gods, Goddesses, and Mythology, Vol. IV.  Tarrytown: Marshall Cavendish, 2005. Print.

Mattusch, C. C. Classical Bronzes: The Art and Craft of Greek and Roman Statuary. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1996.  Print.

Metropolitan Museum of Art Website. Gallery 164. Bronze Stature of Eros Sleeping. Viewed on           10/20/2012 at http://www.metmuseum.org/Collections/search-the-collections/130014998

Westmoreland, P. L.  Ancient Greek Beliefs.  San Ysidro: Lee and Vance Publishing Company, 2007.  Print.