BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – For Illinois Wesleyan University senior Kristin Zavislak, seeing the Ara Pacis – the Roman Emperor Augustus’ monument to peace in Rome – was more than breathtaking, it was oddly familiar.
“I started to notice how the Ara Pacis Augustae was strikingly similar to the Lincoln Memorial,” said Zavislak, a Greek and Roman Studies major from Lombard, Ill.
Her discoveries were recognized earlier this year when Zavislak was chosen as one of five undergraduate students from across the United States to present at the Classical Association of the Middle West and South in Asheville, N.C. Her topic, “An American Emperor and the Roman President: Images of Lincoln and Augustus,” garnered attention. “I heard people talking in the lobby about my presentation, and knew then it was going to draw a crowd,” said Zavislak.
The classical influence on American artists was especially strong in Lincoln’s time. Known as Neoclassicism, it was a period when artists discovered a rebirth of interest in ancient Greek and Roman architecture and art. Zavislak’s paper explored the similar look and feel of art depicting President Abraham Lincoln and the Roman Emperor Caesar Augustus.