Pompeii No.58: Pompeii's Finale

No, I don't mean smoke and ashes. When I say, "Pompeii's Finale," I simply mean that my home mural project has finally come to an end.

Since my last posting. the mural's window plaque has received a gold surface and a Latin inscription. The font is appropriately named Trajan, and the saying translates as, "Know Thyself," wise and profound advice from the ages.

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Here are views of the room as it appears today... 

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I promised my blogging friend Yvette that I would include a view from the kitchen. It's painted an orange, but I think you could also call it a Pompeian yellow.

Of course there is still work to be done — the Roman grille for the window, a solution to shield the kitchen from view while still allowing easy access, perhaps revised lighting, and then finally, the furnishings. That should be a lot of fun. In the meantime, I'll put away the ladder, the drop cloth and many quarts of paint.

Thanks for viewing!

Pompeii No.57: Window Treatments

If you've been following the many installments of the Pompeii Room's evolution, you might remember that I painted the window frame at the very beginning.

I chose to begin there because it was the first thing that people entering the room would see. But I painted it loosely because I wanted to give a little momentum to the project. At the time, I said I'd return at a later date and add more detail. Well, that time is now.

I began by repainting the entire frame to better match the rest of the room's masonry. Now all the masonry is in the same color family, primarily a Sherwin Williams paint called Sand Dollar.

Here you can see the before and after. The original window frame was a light mustard yellow that I equated with sandstone, and as you can see, I've better delineated the torus that tops the window frame.

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My friend Sandy — who gives excellent critiques — thinks that the cobalt blue plaque makes the frame a little too top heavy, even if it will be getting an inscription. She's made a suggestion that I like, and so that blue will be replaced by my next posting.

You've undoubtedly noticed that in all my images of the Pompeii Room's window, I've masked the actual window with gray. That's because I've been bothered all along by a venetian blind, which quickly destroys the illusion I've been working hard to create.

Greek Revival America  |  Roger G. Kennedy  |  detail of a photograph by Robert Lautman

What I really wanted was a Roman grill like the image above. I drew plans of such a window and even consulted with a fine carpenter who's done other work on the house.

homedepot.com

I also looked into the possibility of using industrial grilles.

And then last week, while my house was being tented, I discovered this antique screen, originally hinged as a room divider. If you look closely, you might be able to see that by removing an X'd unit from the bottom of each panel, the fit will be almost perfect. I'm thrilled.

I hope you'll join me for the next installment!

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Pompeii No.56: The Tympanum

In Pompeii No. 41, I showed the pediment above the kitchen door thusly, asking my readers whether its interior should be left plain or ornamented. The unanimous response was that the tympanum (properly identified by Jim of The Road to Parnassus) should be ornamented, and so by popular demand, that's the project for this week.

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My first tympanum drafting was "A," but the more I looked at it, the more those leaf scrolls reminded me of a Victorian furniture design. So I redesigned the tympanum as "B," which has a more graceful and authentically Greek feel to it. (The Pompeians were looking to ancient Greece for inspiration.) Incidentally, all parts of the mural have been worked out in tracings like the examples above.

www.buffaloah.com

The architectural decoration above is called an akroter, and is found at the apex of gables on classical buildings, especially Greek temples. Within the typical akroter is an element called the palmette, which I'm incorporating into my own design.

Ercolano-Green by Richard Ginori  |  www.klatmagazine.com

This handsome plate also features palmettes.

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The finished tympanum — a look one doesn't often see above a kitchen door. Thanks to my readers for encouraging me to add it!

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Pompeii No.55: An Homage to Piranesi

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I decided that my Pompeian mural would not be complete without an homage to one of the most remarkable men of the eighteenth century, Giovanni Battista Piranesi. Piranesi (1720-1778) was born in the then Republic of Venice, and studied with his uncle, who was an engineer specializing in excavation. Perhaps that whetted Giovanni's appetite for the etchings that would make him famous.

Piranesi: The Complete Etchings  |  Luigi Ficacci

At the age of 20, Piranesi went to Rome, studied etching and engraving, and soon produced a series of Roman views that brought him his initial fame. Above is his depiction of the ruins of the forum of Nerva.

Piranesi: The Complete Etchings  |  Luigi Ficacci

Piranesi measured the ruins of Rome, then made beautiful topographic maps, as well as reconstructions of imperial Rome at its height. Above is Piranesi's reconstruction of the Campus Martius, originally a military field dedicated to the god Mars. Below is a another reconstruction of the Campus Martius, perhaps inspired by Piranesi's work.

en.wikipedia.org

Piranesi: The Complete Etchings  |  Luigi Ficacci

If that were that not enough, Piranesi recorded countless Roman fragments in multiple compositions like the one above.

The three previous engravings came from this book published by Taschen, and no library of architectural history (or for that matter decorative design) would be complete without it.

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I should add before I go on that Piranesi is also famous for having drawn a series of imagined prisons. They'd fit in nicely with contemporary fantasy art and today's blockbuster movie sets. Piranesi was a most prolific fellow.

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When I saw this lovely urn, designed by Piranesi, I thought it would be perfect to place between the living room's ignudi.

As you can see, my own version has a different bottom than the original reference, but one that is also based on a Piranesi design.

Such a substantial urn deserves a plinth, perhaps even one with a commemorative portrait. But who is this? Certainly not Giovanni Battista Piranesi!

It is yours truly. The self-portrait measures approximately three inches high, or about the same size you're seeing it now, if you have a 21.5-inch screen.

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Now the ignudi can contemplate the urn, rather than ogle each other, as they seemed to be doing before. This is a dark corner that abuts a floor-to-ceiling mirror, so it's a little difficult to light properly.

This angled view is actually a truer representation.

And with that, the living room part of the mural is finished. Now I'm going to double back and tweak a couple areas to which I mentioned I would return.

I hope you'll join me for the next stage.

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Pompeii No.54: Adding a Brown Anole

I thought that for the next stage of the mural, I would add a touch of Florida, which is where I'm located. And what better than the brown anole, which is more familiarly called the gecko.

www.orlandosentinel.com

Actually, the native lizard is the green anole. The brown anole is Cuban and started proliferating in Florida in the 1970s. A more aggressive lizard, the brown anole chased the green anoles off the ground and into the bushes and trees. On any given day, I see a half dozen brown anoles on my porch, but never green ones.

timmitchellbiology.weebly.com

This remarkable photograph of a green anole eating its nemesis comes by way of Timothy Mitchell's blog, which can be found here. The scene is usually reversed.

And so, because I associate the Cuban anole rather than the green anole with my environment, I have placed him at the top of my Carracci wall. A lamp is below this image, so in real life the anole would be in the very same spot, waiting for a morsel to happen by.

In my next posting I'll add one more element to the living room wall, then I'll pull back to reveal that part of the mural, completed. I hope you'll join me then!
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Pompeii No.53: It's Only Paint!

After framing the Diana painting with Clovio's design from the Farnese Hours, it came time to hang the painting. For a long time, I had in mind to hang it from a blue ribbon, tied with a bow.

Perhaps I was subconsciously thinking of the later French decorative groupings of implements that are properly referred to as "symbols." I also thought the blue bow would be a nice balance to the ignudi's draping in the lower part of the mural.

I was initially very pleased with the final result. But upon looking at it the next morning, I liked it much less. It wasn't just that the bow was a little too sweet, or that I was getting further and further away from Neoclassism. I realized that the blue was more intense than any color in the Diana painting, especially as it was surrounded by that dark auburn. Because of that, it was pulling the eye away from the painting. Can you see that the bow is actually quite a distraction?

So this is when you say to yourself, "It's only paint! Let's go to Plan B."

My second hanger is a simple unbowed ribbon, austere by comparison.

Now, once again, the painting predominates.
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