07.12.2019 – 16.02.2020; Vorarlberg.
What remained of the once powerful Roman Empire?
The Austrian photo artist Alfred Seiland (born 1952) deals with this question in his large-scale photographic project Imperium Romanum. Since 2006 he has documented architectural and scenic traces of Roman antiquity around the Mediterranean Sea and in neighbouring areas. He is interested in how the people of the present deal with the historical sites, what modern civilization, ageing and weathering processes make of the remains of antiquity.
Seiland explores the sites of the past empire and their effects in the present with a subtle, unpretentious look, questioning the current way of dealing with them: areas of tension between historical capital and contemporary marketing, museum care and tourist wear and tear, preservation and destruction of ancient heritage. His precisely balanced compositions do not convey a sublime image of antiquity. They convey breaks in the reception of antiquity, which sometimes contain ironic, bizarre, absurd moments.
Alfred Seiland – Imperium Romanum
07.12.2019 – 16.02.2020
vorarlberg museum
Kornmarktplatz 1
6900 Bregenz
www.vorarlbergmuseum.at
