The investigation of late antique statuary lies at the intersection of various scholarly disciplines studying the ancient world. Late-antique statues are an example of a slowly dying genre, i.e. sculpture in the round, to which particular importance is attached, perhaps precisely because fewer and fewer such statues were being made. Statues set up in public are an important index of the continuity of civic practices in Late Antiquity; statues in the private sphere demonstrate the longevity of classical mythological themes during the transition to the Middle Ages. The intellectual quality of inscriptions on statue bases confirms the general picture of an elite that rejoiced in education, while the mutilation and destruction of portraits simultaneously attest to a fear of statues.
These are only a few aspects of the significance and differing understandings of statuary in Late Antiquity that are discussed by archaeologists, historians, and art historians in this volume. In the process, questions not just of the chronology of statues and the formation of statue-collections, but also of contextualization in both the private and the public spheres are addressed. Particular attention is paid to the reasons for the end of the production of statues, and to the question of which forms of representation took their place.
With contributions by Johanna Auinger ∙ Sarah Bassett ∙ Franz Alto Bauer ∙ Marianne Bergmann ∙ Barbara E. Borg ∙ Robert Coates-Stephens ∙ Niels Hannestad ∙ Susanne Muth ∙ Elisabeth Rathmayr ∙ R. R. R. Smith ∙ Peter Stewart ∙ Lea Stirling ∙ Christian Witschel

„Abschliessend ein mit Bewunderung verbundener Dank an die Hg.: Seit Jahren sah man keinen Sammelband derartig sorgfältig redigiert, typographisch durchdacht und mit gleich hilfreichen Indices erschlossen.“

In: Museum Helveticum. (2009). S. 165-166.

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„Dem Tagungsband ist es gelungen, Beiträge vereint zu haben, welche die spätantike Plastik in sehr unterschiedlichen Bereichen problematisieren und mit ihren Thesen zu weiteren Diskussionen über das noch längst nicht erschöpfte Thema anregen werden.“

In: Klio. 91 (2009) 1. S. 261-263.

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„(...) These are merely the responses of one reader to this stimulating volume, which is simultaneously capable of serving as an up-to-date introduction to the field, as a major contribution to the same, and finally as a spur to further reflection. The editors are to be applauded for soliciting such a coherent collection of studies, the authors for responding to the challenge and to each other's arguments. Specialists in the field of late antique sculpture will want to read Statuen in der Spätantike from cover to cover, while anyone with an interest in late antique and early Byzantine culture and society will find much food for thought within its pages.“

In: Bryn Mawr Classical Review. 2008.07.48. http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/bmcr/2008/2008-07-48.html

Franz Alto Bauer has been Full Professor of Late Antique and Byzantine Art History at the Ludwig-Maxilians-Universität in Munich since 2006. He finished his dissertation, on the lay-out of public space in late-antique Rome and Constantinople, in 1993; and in 2001 he completed his Habilitation, on the building policies of the early medieval popes, at the University of Basel. Fellowships, professional appointments, and visiting professorships have taken him to Rome, Istanbul, New York, Washington, and Zürich. Professor Bauer has published numerous articles on many different aspects of late-antique and early-medieval Art History, particularly on the problem of architecture and liturgy and the relationship of cityscape and ceremonial. He is currently interested in the presentation of the saint in the early medieval period and in the significance of portable objects as media of representation.

Christian Witschel has been Full Professor of Ancient History at the Ruprecht-Karls-Universität Heidelberg since 2005. After study at the Freie Universität Berlin and Oxford, he wrote a dissertation at Frankfurt a.M. University on the third century AD in the western half of the Roman Empire. In 2004 he completed his Habilitation at the LMU in Munich, writing on the means and mechanisms of imperial representation in the Roman Empire. He has been employed as Assistant Professor at both the RKU Heidelberg and the LMU Munich. His current interests include Roman History (especially the history of cities in Late Antiquity), changes in forms of representation in the Roman Empire, Latin epigraphy, and the end of Roman rule in the northwest provinces.