Idols at the MARQ

Collaborative exhibition looking at belief systems on the Iberian Peninsula

IDOLS. Ancient views (Ídolos. Miradas Milenarias), the first exhibition of 2020 to take place at Alicante archaeology museum (MARQ), was inaugurated last week.

Organised in collaboration with Madrid regional archaeology museum (MAR) and the support of 20 other Spanish and Portuguese museums, the exhibition is described as the ‘best testament to the collective beliefs of the

Final Neolithic (approx. 4500-3200 BC) and Chalcolithic (approx. 3500-1700 BC) civilisations’.

It contains 226 anthropomorphic figures – displayed in two rooms and the MARQ’s central passageway – that have been known from the first half of the twentieth century as ‘idols’, which are considered to be visual and schematic references to the oriental mother goddess, containing a human body and face.

By pooling their resources the MARQ and MAR have brought together an exhibition that, in the light of the most recent research, brings us closer to the societies that created the pieces, and how they used them to maintain social order by invoking lineage and the ancestors.

The pieces, of diverse nature and form, focus on the southern half of the Iberian Peninsula, and the collective shared beliefs of Final Neolithic and

Calcolithic civilisations, between 3300 and 2500 BC.

The MARQ is situated at Plaza Dr. Gómez Ulla, Alicante and is open from Tuesday to Friday from 10.00-19.00, Saturdays from 10.00-20.30 and Sundays and public holidays from 10.00-14.00. It is closed on Mondays.

The exhibition is open to the public until April 19.

General admission is €3.