Page 41 - Beholding Liberty!

The Greece of ruins in the visual arts matches the situation of the Greek
world, in decline, due to the century-long Ottoman yoke. In parallel, then, with antiquity, travellers make known
to the West the state of affairs
in the Greek area. By recognising
the Neo-Greeks as direct descendants and continuation of their glorious ancestors, they also raise the issue
of an autonomous national trajectory
for the Greeks and their liberation.
In that sense, archaeolatry will constitute an early stage of Philhellenism and
its necessary background, based
on classical European education
and love for ancient Greece.
As the Greek regeneration draws closer, travellers increase, coming from more
Friedrich Hölderlin, Hyperion or the hermit in Greece, 1797
and more countries; the same stands for their publications, as well as
for artworks with Greek themes, even
by travellers who have not visited Greece for in situ inspection. At the same time, their contemporary Christian Greeks and their daily life obtain a bigger and bigger part in the depictions
and descriptions of Greece.
By the early 19th century and on the verge of the Revolution, influential writers (such as Byron and Chateaubriand), eye-witnesses of their contemporary Hellenism, address themselves to
the civilized and Christian West stating clearly the demand for the liberation
of the Greeks.
Ι.1
From Archaeolatry to Philhellenism
«I love this Greece all over. It bears the colour of my heart. Wherever you look a joy lies buried»
Η ΑΦΥΠΝΙΣΗ ΤΟΥ ΕΛΛΗΝΙΣΜΟΥ Από την αρχαιολατρία στον Φιλελληνισμό 41