David Giese
American, born 1944Arcadia Personified, 1992
Not on view
Concrete, paint and mixed media
Dimensions79 × 60 × 16 in. (200.7 × 152.4 × 40.6 cm)
Gift of Ethan Karp, 2010.243
David Giese creates large concrete laminated and mold-formed depictions of fictitious ruins excavated from Villa Bitricci, an imaginary site where the artifacts were supposedly found. In the story Giese created, Villa Bitricci is the longest continuous private residence in Western civilization, where thousands of famous citizens and artists lived and visited.
While his works imitate ancient artifacts dug up from archeological sites, they are made from modern materials. While the finished works seem extremely heavy, as if made from ancient concrete or carved stone, they weigh a fraction of an actual ancient ruin. Works like Arcadia Personified incorporated stylistic elements from various points in history, thus creating an object that at first appears ancient but is inextricably contemporary.
