Caesars of Rome is a collaborative exhibition featuring the visual artwork of Marek Danielewski alongside the poetry of Atlas, Margot Berlin, Mollie Connelly-MacNeill, Natasha N. Deonarain, Lessie Dingler, Alfred Fournier, Lester Joos, Autumn McBride, Trevor Ruth, and Randy Sproat.
These contemporary creative works respond to Ancient Roman historian, Gaius Suetonius Tranquillus', historical writing, entitled The Twelve Caesars. Suetonius wrote about the first twelve Caesars of the Roman Empire, providing valuable insight into the lives and times of these powerful leaders.
The portraits, created by Danielewski, feature mixed media that was collected from city streets, including motifs of iconic American imagery such as the Converse Star and the American flag. This familiar contemporary imagery serves to blur the lines of history while implying similarities between the Ancient Roman empire and the United States.
The poems, composed by several poets, were inspired by the lives of the featured Caesars. Some of these poems have adopted the poet’s interpreted voice of their Caesar, often ruminating on their astonishing lives, apologizing (or not) for their heinous deeds as leaders of men, telling stories of what it was like growing up among their people and showcasing the vulnerabilities of simply being human.
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