Upon entering the towering, revolving glass doors of the Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archeology in Oxford and passing through its main lobby, one need only to peer down over the railing into the main exhibit to witness a pinnacle of strength and skill. There stands a two meter bronze cast of Zeus, the most dominant of the Greek gods, poised to hurl his signature lightning bolt with all the force of his generously defined muscular frame. Sculptures from this time were intended to capture the most idealized form of man. Their goal was to inspire awe and pay respect to the strongest of leaders, solidifying their place in the annals of history. For this reason, the Aphrodisias Fisherman (above left)—a modest sculpture of a common old man discovered in the Hadrianic Baths of (now) Turkey and dating between 150 and 250 AD —seems so out of place beside the great Zeus.
For one thing, the plaster cast of the old fisherman is not even complete. The head, torso, and a stint of a leg are completely separate from the leg and base. The arms are missing entirely. The downcast, scrawny older man hidden behind a grizzled beard is not the stunning depiction of youth and majesty; he looks pathetic. It is presumed that this fisherman once held a fishing rod and basket of fish in his once existent hands.
As it is a secondary cast, there is difficulty assessing the degree of skill and craftsmanship exemplified in this piece of art. But that is beside the point. The true distinguishing element is in matter rather than mode. The sculptor chose to dedicate his time and talents to depict an average, boring fisherman. By placing the pitiful upon a pedestal, the onlooker is urged to recall the everyday reality of the time period and not just wallow in the majestic mythology of the powerful. The old fisherman humanizes a distant era. There is extraordinary detail and tremendous workmanship, but the real value is found by understanding it as an alternative to the dominating standard of art at the time. It pushes the boundaries of what would have been considered “art-worthy”.
The secondary significance of this piece may be understood in the broken figure itself. To even comprehend the partial figure as a body requires some imagination. This fisherman appears incomplete, battered and bruised, but still standing. This intensifies his tight-stretched face and further develops his distressed disposition. He has not just endured the difficulties of poverty and oppressive rule, but the sands of time. There is no hint of him being a fisherman without reading the attached description, and this is still just speculation. This ambiguity engenders sympathy for the figure. The spectator does not see a fisherman upon first inspection, but an underdog, an honest man working to hold his head up while staring down the narrows of a long dusty road. The observer may see a woman struggling to find the bright side of a terminal illness; or a teenage boy struggling to cope with the divorce of his parents; or a husband feeling confined by a dead-end marriage and a dead-end job in a dead-end town. The piece praises the perseverance of the average. It appeals to the feelings of isolation and desperation that exists in all of us, independent of time and space.
As a novice critic of ancient art, I can recklessly say that the Old Fisherman is an above average piece of art. But more important, it successfully captures the universal struggle of humans to find wholeness, to find a place in history. It sheds light on the everyday man that art of that period disregarded. It stands as hope that perseverance is possible and that majesty is not just the domain of the mighty.
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