Lecture by Beat Brenk, Visiting Professor
The tradition of aquatic-maritime scenes was vital through the whole Roman and Early Christian period. This lecture deals with the essential question, why it happened that mosaics on Early Christian apses, on triumphal arches and on clear stories were placed? Why did Early Christianity decide to use mosaics? The aquatic-maritime iconography was by definition inoffensive, conventional and neutral and allowed the Christians to connect and insert Christian scenes in manifold contexts.
Beat Brenk, Professor Emeritus from the University of Basel, Switzerland, is teaching a graduate seminar on Imperial Representation and the Power in Late Antique Art and Architecture, and an undergraduate seminar on Light and Power: Art of Mosaics in the Middle Ages at the Department of Art & Art History during Fall 2008.