Antinoo disparu: memories of a desire

The Antinoo disparu exhibition at Villa Adriana in Tivoli, divided into two parts by chronological and planning order, pays homage to Marcel Proust 100 years after his death. The exhibition project, curated by the director of the VillÆ Andrea Bruciati, is inspired by the figure of Antinous, a beautiful lad whom the emperor Hadrian met in Bithynia and who became his favourite. The young man, who drowned in the Nile under mysterious circumstances, was deified by the emperor and his effigy was used for the different portraits declined according to the requests of the time.

Similar are the photographic works of Wilhelm von Gloeden (Wismar 1856 – Taormina 1931) and Wilhelm von Plüschow (Wismar 1852 – Berlin 1930), two German photographers who, attracted by the Mediterranean sun of Italy, specialized in Arcadian portraits where the ruins become almost backgrounds of the myth of antiquity. Both, however, were affected by the decadent climate characteristic of the intellectual classes of the time. However, while Wilhelm von Gloeden, from a stylistic point of view refers to a dream world, in which the archaeological dimension serves as a background for a world now lost forever, Wilhelm von Plüschow rarely applies the retouching of the negatives, preferring a realistic and naturalistic rendering of the subjects. The intent of the exhibition is therefore to invite reflection along the lines of Yourcenar, soliciting a comparison between different arts and eras, dominated by the temporal dimension. This meaning of Time derives from Marcel Proust's Dance of the heads, in the last book of the Recherche, as reiterated in the second moment of the project scheduled for the autumn (I am the strength of the past: the portrait of Hadrian).

Photo credits: courtesy of Villa Adriana official site