Ostia Antica by Janine Reeves

Last Friday I joined a group of Architectural students with their Professor to spend a day at Ostia Antica. I was very excited about going on this trip as I'd never been before.

Ostia Antica is a huge site which used to be the busy working harbour city of ancient Rome. It was founded in 4th Century BC it became a great port town and later a strategic centre for defence and trade. Barbarian invasions and the outbreak of malaria led to the abandonment of the city in the 5th century AD.  It was slowly buried under many feet of river silt, up to 2nd floor level.

There were 20 baths at one time in this city.  The population was quite large and there were probably travellers passing through.  Hot baths, medium and cold, used in order to open up the pores of the skin to release dirt - then gradually close them up (no soap).  I hadn't realised that the walls were all heated too.  Pipes remain and you can see them inbetween the brick of the wall and the marble.  Many slaves were needed behind the scene's to keep the fires going to heat the water while those above relaxed in the warmth and used the baths as a social meeting and commercial centre to do business. 

The beautiful mosaics which remain are stunning.  The splendor of the city is really easy to visualise as you walk through the streets.  Doorways, shops, the baths, temples, a theatre, columns, you can even explore some of the apartments which open onto a courtyards of gardens, each replicating the other, not so different from today.

My favourite buildings included the bar (complete with fresco of menu, bar, garden with fountain and mosaic flooring.  Fabulous, just empty of contents, what a shame!) and a beautiful villa with marble walls and fountains, and coloured mosaic flooring which I will definitely go back and paint, and the very necessary toilet areas.

Of course I had to ask - were these toilets segregated, apparently some were and some were not. I used the moment to have a rest and use (not literally) the facilities. Very comfortable - a smaller hole for sitting on, and an interesting trough on front of your feet - No, not for gentlemen to use but to bend down and use the running water in the trough, to wet your sponge to wipe your intimate areas (no toilet paper in those days).

This really is a wonderful site, and yet probably nearly half of it has still not been excavated.  This city built of brick has very unusual intricate patterning which may indicate that the bricks would have been left exposed rather than covered over. 

It was a cold, drizzly day with a wind that ate into you but I was in my element.  I loved the trip and my whole being felt as if I was there back in time.  I really felt the elegant splendor of the city and the buzz of the trades people as they went about their daily business.  The beauty, stature, administration and organisation of the Romans, they integrated all types of people and religion into their culture are elements that we can perhaps only wonder at now, as we continue struggle with racial tensions and religious conflict in our own culture.

Hadrian's Villa by Janine Reeves

Last Friday I went off on another site visit; this time to the southern olive-clad slopes near Tivoli, as a guest of the Pantheon Institute. This trip was planned as an architectural analysis of the site led by Professor James Cooper who I hope was delighted to have me tag along - after all - to be an artist you have to understand the planning or the skeleton before you can create the skin or the form to portray or create art.......

The weather forecast, I have to say was wet, heavy rain and cloudy - and it was! In fact during the day apart from the students I went with, we saw a total of four other people over the whole massive site, obviously most people decided not to be out in the open site all day with no shelter or cafeteria to hide in!

So, I know you are thinking its just a villa: but this is Hadrian's Villa built by Emperor Hadrian, starting from 117A.D., as an imperial palace far away from the city of Rome. It covers at least 80 hectares, more or less equivalent to Pompeii.So it was not just the Emperor who would stay there but most of the senate, guard and all the slaves needed to work the villa and heat the baths etc.

So layered up with numerous t-shirts, jumper and at least two pairs of socks, off I go with my paints and sketch pad -

I have to be honest, I was really apprehensive about joining architectural students from Penn State University, what do I know about Architecture, but it was absorbing and I really loved learning about how advanced the Roman architecture was - the loading for the support systems and beautiful elegant arches - so rather than looking at a lot of ruins - I was virtually transformed into this beautiful vista of elegant marble villas, beautiful cascades of fountains, sun drenched windows, startling coloured flooring and hot baths (I was most definitely NOT thinking about the cold or tepid baths today!)

From a brief passage of the writer Aurelio Vittore, it can be deduced that the Emperor took part directly in the design of the Villa, confirming another piece of information claiming Hadrian was both architect and mastermind behind the complex.

My favourite site was the Water Court (Piazza d'Oro) - a complex of areas for formal occasions. Professor Cooper refers to it as "one of the most extraordinary constructions of the Villa with its varied and articulated plan and architectural structure.Access to the building is by way of an octagonal shaped vestibule with alternating rectangular and semicircular niches. The roof consists of a cupola as sections supported by arches on ledges, ending in a circular, central opening...."

I felt very peaceful here as I sat on top of a wall and did a quick watercolour sketch using colour to portray an expression - it had already stopped raining by now and the sun was starting to break through...the silence of the site from gangs of tourists or traffic made me realise how much our lives are dominated by noise and we do not give ourselves time or space to think in silence and simply "just be in the moment"

Hadrian had taken this thought and created his own circular island villa (Maritime Theatre) within the complex - a circular canal of water  surrounded a small island on which a miniature villa was constructed, complete with a curved vestibule, a central fountain, annexed rooms and small baths with an apodyterium, frigidarium, calidarium and latrine.(Thats the tepid, cold, hot baths and toilet)

Now I would like an island escape like that - space to be creative.....maybe I will just have to settle for less.

I have learnt so much about the Romans in the last two weeks - and I really feel it is helping me understand the grandeur with which the period evolved, both from a political and administrative means, as well as an artistic appreciation which the Romans took from the Greeks and have given us today such splendor to look back on.