Rubens and the Ancients
Apart from modern artworks, Rubens also engaged with ancient statuary which was readily available in Rome. The Flemish master encountered a bust of the Stoic thinker Seneca (5 B.C.-65 A.D.), a copy of which Rubens was known to have purchased. In his formative years, Rubens was surrounded by Neo-Stoic humanists, including his brother Philip (1574-1611) and the university teacher of his brother, leading Neo-Stoic philosopher Justus Lipsius (1547-1606). As a discerning artist, Rubens was interested not only in Seneca’s philosophy but perhaps more so in the sculptural representation of the ancient philosopher.
In the copy made by Rubens, the sculpted bust of Seneca seemingly comes alive. Through delicate hatching and a warm tone, Rubens softened the hardness of the marble in his drawing. To ‘enliven’ the marble bust, Rubens even completed the missing pupils of the bust in his drawing, so that the bust would appear to have a serene rather than empty look. Instead of the cold, emotionless face of a marble bust, Rubens’ study shows the soft, enlivened countenance of a living human being while maintaining the bust's aura of tranquility. Rubens’ practice matches his theory. In his theoretical treatise, De Imitatione Statuarum, or On the Imitation of Statues, Rubens exhorted artists to judiciously study ancient statuary. According to Rubens, artists should avoid uncritically replicating the visual effects of stone; instead, they should transform the hardened materiality of a marble statue into the soft fleshiness of a human body when they incorporate statuary into their two-dimensional artworks. In short, the sculptures in Rubens’ sketches no longer smell of stone.
This example effectively demonstrates that, apart from the works by modern masters, Rubens also altered the appearance of antique sculptures according to his own artistic temperament. This further suggests that Rubens did not necessarily treat ancient statuary with more ‘reverence’ than he did modern artworks.