The Role of Cultural Ambiguity in Ownership

A Brief Overview of Subject Matter for Comparison:

In the final decades of the 19th century, Italy became increasingly prominent in migration statistics. Fleeing poverty and agricultural crisis, many of the Italian immigrants of the last decade of the 19th century were largely unskilled and often illiterate. However, there were a few craftsmen, such as sculptor Pompeo Coppini, who represented the handful of those who were proficient in and capable of offering a specialized and creative service to their new host country. Coppini arrived in the United States in 1896 at the age of 26 with high hopes of finding prosperity and opportunity as a successful sculptor and artist. In his autobiographical book, From Dawn to Sunset, Coppini provides an ample, vivacious documentation of his American years, from his arrival to his death in Texas in 1957. It is indisputable that, despite being an Italian-born sculptor, Coppini’s years spent in America shaped not only his artistic skill, but also his perspective. However, the formative period of time spent in Italy was particularly turbulent- economically, socially, politically, and artistically, and had a momentous effect on his artistic approach as well. It is this messy blending of cultures and experiences that creates gray areas when considering the citizenship and origin of his works.

While Coppini entered America through New York, he was able to give substance to his dreams only after he migrated to Texas in 1901, where he was well received. It was in Texas that the sculptural programs available for him became a metaphorical door re-opened to his past as the visual embodiments of his patriotic idealism, artistic style, and technical skills. His American works were directly inspired by many of the factors and events that had paved the way to the formation of the Italian Kingdom in 1860. This is particularly clear in Coppini’s comments where he denounces the use of utilitarian monuments, non-representative or abstract monuments— that by eliminating all visual, material references to events, one destroys the art form itself. He underlines his belief in content when he writes that art:

[U]nless inspired by religion, history or patriotism, unless assuming the responsibility of being the exponent of a glorious past, and

the demonstrator of the gratitude for the living for the greatest contributing events that made for our progress and advanced

civilization, is not a great art (…) art, without an uplifting mission, is not really a fine art, but a simple commercial decoration of the

shallow ornamentation of our homes, or public places, missing thus its high philosophic and moral ideal of educating mankind and

failing to become the perpetual teacher of virtue and truth. An art that has no effect on the betterment of the soul, and on the

building of better character, by a strong message that portrays the better events of the past as a philosophical teaching, or that

brings emphasis to the greatest deeds of our contemporary people, is to my way of thinking as degenerating as are those who like it

that way. (Coppini, 92)

Whether applied to Italy or America, for Coppini, the artistic concepts of “progress and an advanced civilization” and of art as the “perpetual teachers of virtues and truth” are ideas that are a part of a “national inheritance” the result of a “magnificent, romantic, and tragic history.” (Coppini, 90)

Coppini matured these ideas in the wake of the Risorgimento, the political and social movement that consolidated different states of the Italian peninsula into the single state of the Kingdom of Italy. However, it was in America that he relived these romantic words and embodied them in every monument and artistic work he created. One work in particular resides very close to our home in the Panhandle Plains Historical Museum (PPHM), located in Canyon, Texas. Entitled The Triumph of Peace, this work is a three part set that was created from plaster, and then painted to give the essence of terracotta, which is an Italian medium.

This utilization of international inspiration creates cultural ambiguity from the beginning. The aura of this work is overwhelmingly Greek— the figures present in all three sections are dressed in Greek attire and seem to resemble figures represented in Greek mythology. Much of Roman culture was dramatically influenced by the Greeks, and Coppini spent several years studying at an art academy in Rome. The first of the three part set is entitled Only in Peace Triumph the Five Beautiful Arts. It gracefully displaces five figures, all female, draped in flowing cloth and dancing in the clouds. Each of the figures is holding an object that is representational of a major art form— a painter’s easel, a bound literary work, a harp, and a measuring stick. These objects, in addition to the bodies themselves, represent the five major art forms found universally across cultures— visual art, music, literature, architecture, and dance. This piece is a celebration of aestheticism and of the human form itself— an artistic idea derived primarily from art created in Ancient Greece, and therefore also of Roman descent.

This idea of cultural ambiguity brings up a question of ownership. If the legal rights to this piece were to be contested categorically, under what culture or title would this piece belong? Would it be Texan, and therefore intellectual property of the United States because Coppini resided in, was influenced by Texan culture, and made a living as a Texan artist while this piece was created? Or is it Italian because his citizenship and formative, developmental years of his artistic career fall to the Italian state? Is it Roman because it is clearly inspired by what he would have been influenced by in the time he spent studying under Roman artists and being influenced by Roman culture? Is it in any part Greek because Ancient Roman Culture was dramatically inspired by what was trending in Greece? The question could never be answered with absolute certainty because the idea of ownership is not a matter of objectivity.

Coppini was influenced and shaped by a variety of cultures and experiences that bring an additional layer of depth and universalism to his creations. It is because of this that his pieces located in the PPHM look so out of place when juxtaposed to the oil paintings of the Texas Panhandle adjacent to their location. Although they are considered “Texan Art,” these three pieces by Coppini seem to more easily belong in a European gallery.

The Parallel:

The work of Pompeo Coppini is relevant to the material studied in this course, specifically the Parthenon Marbles, because of the idea of cultural ambiguity in relation to ownership. When the Parthenon Marbles were dismounted, they developed a new identity. When they were transferred to England, they developed a new identity. Just like the work of Coppini, the Parthenon Marbles have a complicated cultural heritage. This makes the argument for them to be returned to Greece because they are of the Greek culture and heritage more complicated than it is at face value. Over time, these marbles have assumed a British heritage as well. This idea of cultural ambiguity brings up a question of ownership.