Baltrušaitis e la leggenda della forma di Gilgamesh

Jurgis Baltrušaitis is one of the most representative scholars of the New Formalist School led by Henri Focillon in Paris during the first half of the 20th century. By going through Baltrušaitis’ publications, an interesting case of study is the representation of Gilgamesh. The Lithuanian student wrote a long genealogy of this form that goes from ancient Mesopotamian East to Christian medieval West. We will use Gilgamesh’s shape to explore and compare the formalist method of Baltrušaitis, the iconological method of Panofsky and the relation between words and pictures by Schapiro. In doing so, we will try to re-establish a bond between the visual outline of a man with two specular beasts and the written legends of Gilgamesh and Daniel.