This article presents an analytical study of the Late Antique sculptural relief program at the Roman villa of Chiragan (Martres-Tolosane, Haute-Garonne), which includes a series of mythological panels and a portrait in relief. Although Chiragan’s reliefs have long been associated with Aphrodisian workshops, this study marks them as products of a local workshop, based on stylistic traits and recent scientific analyses of the marble. Using comparanda found in a series of Late Antique portraits from Chiragan, I date the reliefs to the later fourth or early fifth century CE. I also consider evidence for an honorific relief portrait at the villa that, together with the program of architectural relief sculpture, makes explicit reference to a distinctly urban visual rhetoric. In conclusion, I argue that Chiragan’s reliefs actively court association with the urban sphere, which in turn suggests the increasing importance of the villa as a sociopolitical locus in the Late Roman West.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
This article presents an analytical study of the Late Antique sculptural relief program at the Roman villa of Chiragan (Martres-Tolosane, Haute-Garonne), which includes a series of mythological panels and a portrait in relief. Although Chiragan’s reliefs have long been associated with Aphrodisian workshops, this study marks them as products of a local workshop, based on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1494,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[904],"tags":[9,26,28,29],"issues":[776],"region":[],"class_list":["post-1495","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-article","tag-sculpture","tag-lateantiquity","tag-arthistory","tag-romanperiod","issues-776"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n