The Passion

3

Thinking about the section “Cribs-on line” recently, some new ideas and proposals for realising other dioramas came up.
From the point of view of a modeller, the nativity is a nice subject, but has been realised very many times already. I prefer less spoiled and more original subject matter, such as the Passion of Christ; a strong subject and not often represented.

The Lashing

Despite being an atheist, I have always liked this story and since a very young age I have been a fan of “Jesus Christ Superstar.” I have seen the live musical.
But for the Soldatini-on line I couldn’t make Chaiphas and Hannah stand on the scaffolding bare-chested, just to make a funny example (those of you that have seen the old movie will know what I mean). Gibson’s recent reconstruction is much more suitable or our 1/72 miniatures.
Furthermore such diorama include many nice historical subjects that are useful for other dioramas and contests; troops in such trims and civilians are nearly nonexistent within the available commercial sets as with more unusual characters and poses. After all such lashings and crucifictions were not unusual in that period.

The Sentence

I decided to reconstruct some scenes from the recent movie directed by Mel Gibson. They are quite accurate in regards to costume and backgrounds. I try to reconstruct them as best I can, the only evident difference is with the shields. It seemed historically inappropriate to make them totally squared like in the movie. They may look less typically Roman but I chose to make them oval and quite small which is probably more appropriate for town-garrison troops.

"Ecce Homo!" ... "I Wash My Hands!"

"Crucify Him!"
To reconstruct all the scenes would be too much of a big task and would become like some sort of “Via Crucis” made with toy soldiers.
Anyway I plan to make the main scenes at least and hope to finish more scenes before Easter. I have completed only one scene so far and that is the sentencing scene with Jesus in chains, Pilate washing his hands in front of the legionaries (that are keeping back some of ten people guided by Chaiphas, Hannah and another priest. Madonna and Magdalene are in the background.
Then I made the lashing scene with Jesus tied to the column, the legionaries and the officer at the table.
Finally I made the crucifixion scene with Jesus tied to the cross, and a legionary kneeling with hammer and nails. Other figures are the same as in the sentence scene with them changing positions to represent them playing dice on the red cloak. On the side are Madonna and Magdalene kneeling the same as in the sentencing scene, but with slightly changed positions.
I shall make some other scenes in the future.
Already these thirty pieces represent a lot of work: the conversions to the poses, to the faces, to the legionaries panoply, all the hoods and cloaks with their folds, the many accessories (some very tiny) and the spears and some shields necessary on some of the miniatures.
After time spent making the conversions and masters, which came out quite well, I spent extra time making their moulds in order to use resin copies for these mini-dioramas, as is my way, and to be able to make further copies when I need.

The Crucifixion
This time I won't dwell on how I made the miniatures as already I don't remember exactly what I used for their conversions. (In this particular case it sounds quite strange the technical-modellistic term "convertion" ;)
For some miniatures it is not difficult, despite the transformations and the radical restyling, to understand what I used in them. But in some cases I already hardly recognise them converted this way, despite having made them.

I want to thank all who gave me advice, documentations and suggestions, particularly Giovanni Collura who gave me the inspiration in the first place.