Alfred Seiland – Imperium Romanum

A selection of works from Seiland’s epochal photographic study.

For many years now, Alfred Seiland (*1952 in St. Michael, Austria) has been visiting antique sites around the Mediterranean, capturing them with his analog, large-format camera. His destinations are the ruins of the Roman Empire from Egypt, Libya, and Israel to Italy, and the museums of Spain to Turkey. His motifs are often difficult to access—some are not public places and otherwise hidden from tourists. Seiland’s photographs confront the viewer with themes that shed light on the conflict between antiquity and modernity. They mirror famous showplaces of history with their architecture, sculpture, and works of art.

Alfred Seiland condenses moments into perfect compositions, employing color like a painter. Nevertheless, some of the photographs are unsettling, because they time and again tell of the destruction by humans of antique legacies.