Seha Nur Sarı

A Crimson Sunset Falls over Pompeii

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Oil on canvas, 100 × 150 cm, 2021

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Julius Caesar’s face brings together two powerful images of Rome. The she-wolf at the heart of Rome’s foundation myth appears on one side of the figure, while on the other, it transforms into the eagle associated with Roman political and military power. Caesar’s individual face disappears between these two images embedded in Rome’s collective memory.

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This transition also echoes the historical rupture at the heart of Caesar’s time: the dissolution of the Roman Republic and the political transformation that would lead towards the imperial era. The images through which a society represents itself also change form along with its history.

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In the background, Mount Vesuvius rises as myth, history and power converge within the same image. The she-wolf does not disappear; she continues to live within the eagle. The older image persists beneath the new form, resurfacing with another face.