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Chroma: Ancient Sculpture in Color by NYSS Faculty Brandt Junceau in the Brooklyn Rail
February 2, 2023 · Faculty
“In New York this new year, the exhibition with the most argument, conjecture, and consequence is the Metropolitan Museum’s Chroma. This somewhat sly intervention means to reintroduce the presence of color in classical art. Which inadvertently brings up, although it is not discussed, the vulgarity of the ancients. Some authorities are seriously concerned about what we will think, if we ever find out about it. Color is the supposed flashpoint. The exhibition presumes “we” don’t know that the ancients painted marble. Who is responsible for that? We (the public) and they (scholars, critics, curators, administrators) are unnamed parties in an uncertain historiological relationship—what did we know, and when should we have known it?” – Brandt Junceau