the exhibition
noon, December 11, 2021 – 09:08
From the Herculaneum fresco of the “hide-and-seek” to the educating divinities
from Stefano from Stefano
But what were the children of the Greco-Roman age like? How were they fed, represented and above all how did they spend the free time of their tender age? These questions are answered by an exhibition full of curiosities, “Playing in a workmanlike manner”, at the National Archaeological Museum of Naples from today until 2 June. “An exhibition project – explains the director of Mann, Paolo Giulierini – that does not stop at the testimony of the ancient, but that triggers a comparison between these objects between the fifth century BC and the first two after Christ, some toys of the first and according to the twentieth century, and a series of contemporary works of art that refer to a playful matrix ». The curator of the cycle, together with Giulierini himself, is in fact Ermanno Tedeschi, first a gallery owner and then a promoter of artistic events, who selected today’s part of the itinerary. «Learning to play – he explains – means learning to live. The game teaches a method and to be serious, it teaches the game of life and the rules that determine the characteristics of the adult of tomorrow ». A “vis a vis”, therefore, between distant eras, but closer than one can imagine. As evidenced by the objects in the atrium of the museum, a series of colorful and amphora-shaped Barbapapa made by Giorgio Di Palma, a potter from Grottaglie. Or as in the Garden of the Fountains, the modular installation in plastic entitled Ad Ovo: rabbit, hen and hippocampus by Camilla Ancilotto.
From deposits
But there is no doubt that the highlight is in the archaeological objects, mostly recovered from the rich deposits of the Museum, 50 finds divided into 6 sections: infancy, childhood, simple play, games that make you grow, toys and games that make you grow up , all positioned in close contact with modern counterparts. So how not to be enchanted in front of the windows with the terracotta puppets of the 4th century of Capua, one of which with articulated arms and both empty underneath to insert the sticks to move them? And what about the Pompeian statuettes of gladiators from the 1st century. AD similar to today’s toy soldiers with a base with which to move them and make them fight? But in the scientific project of Marialucia Giacco and the exhibition of Silvia Neri, the part dedicated to the sculptures and paintings on the childhood of the time is also striking, such as the two kneeling children of the second half of the 1st century. AD, a portrait of a girl from the end of the I-II century. AD, an “adult” child in a toga from the 1st century. AD, the nine finds including the statuettes of kourotrophos, divinities educating young people of the IV-III century. BC and the ceramic feeding bottles, in daring forms, like that of a small bird, or even an “immortalized” Amorino in the cradle of the III century. BC Finally, the main amusements of ancient children, from the nail game, in which each of the participants had a nail tied to a thread, to be thrown and driven into a mound of sand or earth, on a Pompeian fresco of the 1st century. AD, or the ephedrismòs (the game of the horse) represented in a capuan terracotta of the third century BC, or the hide and seek, from a Herculaneum fresco of the first century AD, the kite on an Attic red-figure ceramic chous of the area Lucana, between 470 and 450 BC, the game of the circle in a terracotta of the III century BC and the bone dice. Among the games of the 20th century, Quercetti’s “pixel” nails are worth mentioning, with which to build images like mosaics on a perforated plastic surface, and among the works a large head of Pulcinella signed by Lello Esposito.
11 December 2021 | 09:08
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