Category: Archeology

True Confession! I'm in Love With Archeology.

4/6/2022

Yes, I love archeology and ancient history.

Whenever I want to relax, I turn on the Science Channel to watch Unearthed, or Mysteries of the Abandoned.

I have two magazine subscriptions (Archaeological Institute of America, and Current World Archeology) and look forward to them like a kid waiting for his Captain Midnight Secret Decoder Ring to arrive in the mail.

On my last vacation I brought books to read and some drawing materials. One book in particular grabbed me and wouldn't let go; The Sutton Hoo Story by Martin Carver. I felt moved to produce drawings inspired by what I learned and saw.

I find myself so fascinated by archeology that, at some point, I may create an entirely new body of work. It's all very speculative, but it is very exciting for me, and I wanted to share it now.

What is Sutton Hoo? ⁠

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It's a burial site in England, with many types of burials, from royal barrows to gallows graveyard, dating from the 6th to 7th centuries.⁠ They appear as mounds on a flat landscape, next to the River Deben. There is a really great movie based on a novel, both called The Dig that dramatizes the excavation of Mound 1, where some of the most impressive and beautiful artifacts ever found in Britain were discovered.

But while I like jewels and treasures, it is the dirt and bones that really intrigue me.

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My first endeavor was a pencil sketch of the remains in burial Mound 17. ⁠

Mound 17 was an un-looted burial mound whose inhabitant was buried in a tree trunk coffin (how COOL is that?) sometime between 560-650 AD. Among other things, there were caldrons, weapons, a comb, and the remains of a bridle. In another mound close by, his horse was interred, along with a bucket of oats.

My next sketch was of another, very different type of grave.

After the region had converted to Christianity, this sacred ground, populated with rich burial mounds for esteemed community leaders, was used as a place to execute convicted criminals. A gallows was erected on one of the mounds, and the site is littered with shallow graves of the disgraced and condemned.

But the thing that makes it all the more more fascinating, is that there is actually no body there at all. The acidic soil of the area consumes organic material.

But the body that was once there changes the make-up of the soil, making it dark and crusty. When someone excavates it, they can carefully remove the soil around where the body once was, leaving a fragile "sand man".

It's sad, it's haunting and it's beautiful.

The last piece I produced is a pencil sketch of an idea I have brewing in the back of my brain. My impulse is to layer, somehow, images and inspirations from digs. I would like to create drawings of the finds, and layer them with schematic diagrams and maps, along with my imagined scenarios of the people and objects when they were alive and in use. I may need to learn a new medium, such as encaustic, to gain the effect I want.

This is a rough idea of what I might do. It is a composite image of things from the famous Mound 1. Below the sketch are images from the book that I have woven into the sketch.

Mound 1 was covering a large ship. Within the hull of the ship there was a wooden burial chamber, containing a coffin and body, and many stunningly valuable grave goods. It is one of the most famous archeological finds in history.

But, like the "sand men", the actual ship, chamber, and body have long since dissolved. But the wood of the ships hull, again, changed the make up of the sand, and what was left was a ghostly impression of a ship, along with the corroded iron rivets, in long, graceful, curving lines.

This is a photograph of Basil Brown, standing in the middle of the ship. He was the self-taught archeologist who excavated the un-looted grave in 1938.

The second image is a schematic drawing archeologists have made, depicting what they believe the original burial chamber within the ship contained.

The third image is a schematic map of the area, with black dots depicting the location of various burial mounds, and the three hypothetical routes by which the mourners transported the ship from the River Deben, up the bank, to the burial site, to inter the deceased.

I'm really not sure where this is headed. It's very exciting and a little scary.

I will continue with my current series of art based on film noir until it feels right to commence on this new path.

Maybe I never will get to it, or maybe I will start next week.

Stay tuned.

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My Vacation From the "Shoulds"

11/15/2021

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I'm on vacation, and I'm having a wonderful time. It's a paradise. Beautiful room, white sand beach, gorgeous view.

And yet, I find myself having a difficult time relaxing entirely. I'm relaxing, but not completely relaxed. I find that I am suffering from a case of the "Shoulds".

Here are a list of my "Shoulds":

- I really need to take advantage of my time here!

- I should make a drawing or painting everyday.

- I should keep posting and staying engaged on social media.

- I should NOT post, and disengage completely.

- I should go I to a deep state of contemplation so I can start developing concepts and imagery for my next body of work.

- I should start collecting words and images for my next body of work.

- I should do paintings of the coastline so I can include coastal scenes in my next body of work.

- Furthermore, I should barely eat anything, so I will still feel okay in my bathing suit.

- I should drink less/more.

- I should swim in the ocean.

- I should go for a hike/sample authentic local cuisine/learn to paddleboard...

Get the idea? So much to ponder and worry about.

I heard a while back that the word "should" can be very toxic. It is a good exercise to replace it with the word "want" and see what happens.

Actually, I have done a number of my "Shoulds", because they seemed like fun at the time.

But what have I done mostly?

Mostly, I have gone on a deep dive into some really nerdy books on archeology.

Yes, archeology is my way to relax.

- I have two magazine subscriptions (World Archeology and The American Institute of Archeology Magazine).

- I am a fan of Patrick Wyman's podcast, Tides of History

- I watch archeology themed shows on TV and YouTube incessantly. (My favorite, which is not exactly about archeology, is Mysteries of the Abandoned on Discovery)

So I'm on a geek-fest, learning about how the Proto-Indo-European language, a theoretical language that became extinct around 2500 BCE, was the root from which most of the languages spoken in the world today evolved from.

What can I say? It's what I want to do.

A bibliography of my vacation:

Three Stones Make a Wall, by Eric H. Cline

The Horse, the Wheel, and Language, by David W. Anthony

Tales of Valhalla, by Martin and Hannah Whittock

Beowulf, translation by Seamus Heaney

The Dig, by John Preston

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An Inspiring Trip to Greece!

8/23/2018

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My husband and I took a trip to a place I've wanted to go for a long time- Greece! We visited mainly Napflio and the Peloponnes Peninsula, the island of Hydra, up to Delphi, then Athens.

Some of you may remember that I love ancient history, and that I did a series of art based on The Odyssey. It was sensational to be in and around the place where The Iliad and The Odyssey was conceived, sung, shared, and eventually written down. In fact, we visited the ancient site of Mycenae, which was the palace complex where Agamemnon himself lived and ruled.

The "Funerary Mask of Agamemnon" from Mycenae, housed at The Archeological Museum in Athens.

(If you'd like to see some of the inspiring art I saw during my trip to Greece, check out my post on my facebook page.)
Being in Greece lent depth and richness to my understanding of The Odyssey. One experience I had was the realization that my conception of the space and atmosphere was generalized and lacking in sensitivity. It was fanciful, but vague.

"The Land of the Lotus Eaters" Leslie Peterson Sapp

The sense I have now is the astounding ruggedness of the place, how rocky mountain slopes charge down and continue deep into the sea.

Delphi, Greece

I also did not have a sense of the palette. These parts of Greece are dry dry dry, and the rocks are pale and crumbly. I suppose the pale rock is part of why the sea is so green-blue.

Greece, somewhere between Epidavros and Poros

The artist whom I can think of who really got a great take on what it feels like to be a westerner, idealizing ancient Greece, is Puvis de Chavannes, a French artist active in the late 19th century.

"The Shepherd's Song" Puvis de Chavannes, 1891

"Patriotism" Puvis de Chavannes, 1893

"Young Girls by the Sea", Puvis de Chavannes, 1879

Also, Picasso captured it, perhaps with more individuality and sophistication, in many of his early works:

"Acrobat on a Ball" Picasso, 1901

"Two Adolescents", Picasso, 1906

"Boy Leading a Horse", Picasso, 1905-6

Although I am committed to doing more Film Noir works for the time being, I am wondering what will transpire if I decide to do more Ancient Literature work in the future. One very inspiring object I saw during my travels is a late Hellenistic funerary urn at the Archeological Museum.

Who knows?

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True Confession! I'm in Love With Archeology.

My Vacation From the "Shoulds"

An Inspiring Trip to Greece!

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