Drawing on both modern artistic responses to the Classical tradition and contemporary queer theory, the 2016 Rumble Lecture explored modes of ‘queering’ ancient Greek art. This involved thinking about Classical art on its own terms (its underlying assumptions about desire, eroticism, and sex, for example); but it also means integrating interests of criticisms and ethics today, re-examining some standard interpretative modes in the aftermath of J. J. Winckelmann’s 1764 History of the Art of Antiquity.

Whitney Davis is Pardee Professor of History & Theory of Ancient & Modern Art at the University of California at Berkeley and Visiting Professor of History of Art at the University of York.