Reconstructing and Deconstructing Rome’s Grottapinta Shrine

Reconstructing and Deconstructing Rome’s Grottapinta Shrine

Elizabeth Kowalchuk, NJIT
Mary Riccio, NJIT
Dr. Louis Hamilton, NJIT

This project studies Roman Street Shrines and their levels of active devotion. In particular, we are studying the Grottapinta shine which displayed high levels of devotion until its “restoration” in 2015, where the alleyway was illuminated and painted while the shrine was encased in a secure and decorative box. To study how the restoration affected perception of the religious space, either as secular or sacred, we recreated the alleyway before and after restorations as 3D models to be viewed through Virtual Reality with eye tracking software, revealing where the points of focus are in the space for different demographics.

Elizabeth Kowalchuk and Mary Riccio are both architecture students at New Jersey Institute of Technology. They are interested in combining their modeling and spatial analysis skills learned through their architecture education to study urban and architectural history. They currently work with Dr. Louis Hamilton in his study of Roman Shrines.

Virtual Reality, Rome, Devotion, 3D Modeling, Photogrammetry