Unit TWO: Late Classical Greek Art STUDY GUIDE

Unit TWO: Late Classical Greek Art STUDY GUIDE

52

G Grave stele of a young hunter (Ilissos River), c. 330 BCE, marbleinfluence of Skopas/ emotional mood

1. A “taste for individual characterization can be seen in the grave stelai of the Late Classical period. Compared with the stele of Hegeso , the relief here is more deeply carved, so that the deceased youth almost looks like a freestanding figure leaning against a marble wall. He has died in the prime of life, a loss accentuated by the sculptor through the youth’s heroic form and the representation of the aged, grieving father at the right. The weeping boy seated on the steps at the left and the dog sniffing the ground add touches of pathos that become typical of Greek art in subsequent centuries” (Adams, Art Across Time 181).

2. The fourth-century sculptor Skopas appears to have influenced this work. Skopas “had a brilliant career as both sculptor and architect that took him around the Greek world. Unfortunately, little survives, either originals or copies, that can be reliably attributed to him, even though early writes credited him with one whole side of the sculptural decoration of Mausolos’s tomb. If the literary accounts are accurate, Skopas introduced a new style of sculpture admired in its time and influential in the following Hellenistic period. In relief compositions, he favored very active, dramatic poses over balanced, harmonious ones, and he was especially noted for the expression of emotion in the facial features and body gestures of his figures” (Stokstad, Art History 202-203). “The dead youth, isolated from his companions in life, gazes evenly at the visitor. The youth is in the style close to the work of Skopas: he has a squarish head with deep-set eyes and bulging brows. Varied views of the torso, legs, and feet introduce torsion into the body. The pathos of the scene is blatant”

H Lysippos. Farnese Herakles (Weary Herakles), Roman copy of a bronze original of c. 320 BCELysippos, Alexander the Great’s favorite/ attributes of Herakles/ rejection of stability and balance/ expression of dejection

1. “The sculptor Lysippos is unique in that many details of his life are known. He claimed to be entirely self-taught and asserted that ‘nature’ was his only model, but he must have received training in the technical aspects of his profession in the vicinity of his home in Sikyon, near Corinth. Although he expressed great admiration for Polykleitos, his own figures reflect a different set of proportions than those of the fifth-century BCE master, with small heads and slender bodies like those of Praxiteles” (Stokstad, Art History 203).

2. “Ancient sources reveal that Alexander believed that only Lysippos had captured his essence in a portrait , and that is why only he was authorized to sculpt the king’s image” (Kleiner, Mamiya, and Tansey 144). “Lysippos was widely known and admired for his monumental statues of Zeus, which may be why he was summoned to do a portrait of Alexander the Great. Lysippos portrayed Alexander as a full-length standing figure with an upraised arm holding a scepter, just as he is believed to have posed Zeus, though none of these statues still exists” (Stokstad, Art History 203).3. This copy of a work by Lysippos depicts Herakles after he has completed the last of his Twelve Labors. “The exaggerated muscular development of Herakles is poignantly ironic, for the sculptor depicted the strongman as so weary that he must lean on his club for support. Without that prop Herakles would topple over. Lysippos and other fourth-century BC artists rejected stability and balance as worthy goals of statuary. Herakles hold the golden apples of the Hesperides in his right hand behind his back- unseen unless one walks around the statue” (Kleiner, Mamiya, and Tansey 143-144).

4. “Instead of expressing joy, or at least satisfaction, at having completed one of the impossible twelve labors, he is almost dejected. Exhausted by his physical efforts, he can think only of his pain and weariness, not of the reward of immortality that awaits him. Lysippos’s portrayal of Herakles in this statue is perhaps the most eloquent testimony yet to Late Classical sculptors’ interest in humanizing the great gods and heroes of the Greeks. In this respect, despite their divergent styles, Praxiteles, Skopas, and Lysippos followed a common path” (144).

I The Greek Tholos

1. “Buildings with a circular plan had a long history in Greece going back to Mycenaean beehive tombs. In later times a variety of tholoi, or circular-plan buildings, were erected. Some were shrines or monuments and some, life the fifth-century BCE tholos in the Athens Agora, were administrative buildings, but the function of many, such as a tholos built shortly after 400 BCE in the Sanctuary of Athena Pronaia at Delphi, is unknown” (Stokstad, Art History 199).

2. “Theodoros, the presumed architect, was from Phokaia in Asia Minor. The exterior was of the Doric Order, as seen from the three columns and a piece of the entablature that have been restored. Other remnants suggest that the interior featured a ring of columns with capitals carved to resemble the curling leaves of the acanthus plant. This type of capital came to be called ‘Corinthian’ in Roman times. It had been used on roof-supporting columns in temple interiors since the mid-fifth century BCE, but it was not used on building exteriors until the Hellenistic period” (199-200).

Unit TWO: Late Classical Greek Art STUDY GUIDE

53

J The Monumental Tomb of Mausolos

1. “Monumental tombs were designed as large, showy memorials to their wealthy owners. One such tomb was built for Mausolos, prince of Karia, at Halikarnassos in Asia Minor, where Herodotus, the “father of history,’ had been born more than a century earlier. This monument was so spectacular that later writers glorified it as one of the Seven Wonders of the World. Mausolos, whose name has given us the term mausoleum (a large burial structure), was the Persian governor of the region. He admired Greek culture and brought to his court Greek writers, entertainers, and artists, as well as the greatest sculptors to decorate his tomb. The structure was completed after his death in 353 BCE under the direction of his wife, Artemisia, who was rumored to have drunk her dead husband’s ashes mixed with wine” (Stokstad, Art History 200).

2. “Except for traces of the foundation, a few scattered stones, and many fragments of sculpture and moldings that are now in various museums, Mausolos’s tomb vanished in the Middle Ages. Although early descriptions are often ambiguous, the structure probably stood about 150 feet high and rose from a base measuring 126 by 105 feet. The elevation consisted of three main sections: a plain-surfaced podium, a colonnaded section in the Ionic order, and a stepped roof. The roof section measured about 24 ½ feet high and was topped with marble statues of a four-horse chariot and driver. The exterior decoration consisted of Ionic friezes and an estimated 250 freestanding statues, lifesize or larger, including more than 50 lions around the roofline. The friezes were sculpted in relief with battle scenes of Lapiths against centaurs and Greeks against Amazons… Statues of Mausolos’s relatives and ancestors stood between the columns in the colonnade; statues of hunters killing lions, boars, and deer encircled the next level down; below them was a circle of unidentified standing figures; and around the base was a battle between Greeks and Persians. Originally, all the sculptural elements of the tomb were painted” (200-201).

3. “A preserved male statue from the tomb was long believed to be of Mausolos himself. The man’s broad face, long, thick hair, short beard and moustache, and stocky body could represent the features of a particular individual, but it is more likely that the statue represents a new heroic ideal- a glorification of experience, maturity, and intellect over youthful physical beauty and athletic vigor. The heavy swathing of drapery drawn into a thick mass around the waist reveals the underlying body forms while providing the necessary bulk to make the figure impressive to a viewer at the bottom of the monument” (201).

K Polykleitos the Younger. Greek theater (Epidauros), c. 350 BCEthree days of drama/ orchestra/ theatron open to the sky/ skene/ cavea/ the chorus and actors wearing masks/ focus on fate (man in conflict with the gods)

1. “In ancient Greece, the theater was more than mere entertainment; it was a vehicle for the communal expression of religious belief through music, poetry, and dance. In very early times, theater performances took place on the hard-packed dirt or stone-surfaced pavement of an outdoor threshing floor (halos)- the same type of floor later incorporated into religious sanctuaries. Whenever feasible, dramas were presented facing a steep hill that served as a kind of natural theater. Eventually such sites were made into permanent open-air auditoriums. At first, tiers of seats were simply cut into the side of the hill. Later, builders improved them with stone” (Stokstad, Art History 209).

2. “During the fifth century BCE, the plays primarily were tragedies in verse based on popular myths and were performed at a festival dedicated to Dionysos. At this time, the three great Greek tragedians- Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides- were creating the works that would define tragedy for centuries. Many theaters were built in the fourth century BCE, including those on the side of the Athenian Acropolis and in the sanctuary at Delphi, also for the performance of music and dance during the festival of Dionysos. Because theaters were used continuously and frequently modified over many centuries, no early theaters have survived in their original form” (209).

3. “The largely intact theater at Epidauros, however, which dates from the early third century BCE, presents good examples of the characteristics of early theaters. A semicircle of tiered seats built into the hillside overlooked the circular performance area, called the orchestra, at the center of which was an altar to Dionysos. Rising behind the orchestra was a two-tiered stage structure made up of the vertical skene (scene)- an architectural backdrop for performances and a screen for the backstage area- and the proskenion (proscenium), a raised platform in front of the skene that was increasingly used over time as an extension of the orchestra. Ramps connecting the proskenion with lateral passageways(parodoi; singular parodos) provided access to the stage for performers. Steps gave the audience access to the fifty-five rows of seats and divided the seating area into uniform wedge-shaped sections. The tiers of seats above, the wide corridor, or gangway, were added at a much later date. This design provided uninterrupted sight lines and good

54

L Greek Drama

1. “Together with medieval morality plays, Greek tragedies and comedies are the forerunners of all theatrical representations as we know them. In the case of the Greeks, the division into two genres existed from the beginning. The nature of each was governed by what preceded them; also by the conditions under which they were performed. Both evolved from improvised songs and dances in honor of Dionysius, the god of wine. Tragedy originated in the dithyramb, a kind of choral performance in which the members of the chorus were dressed as satyrs. These performances were probably always competitive. Originally the prize was a goat, afterwards sacrificed to the god- hence the word ‘tragedy,’ which means goat-song in Greek. The origin of comedy was the comus, a ribald comic chorus with performers wearing extravagant disguises. This went round from house to house. The obscenity and scurrility associated with the comus contained a ritual element- they were thought to ward off evil” (Lucie-Smith 68).

2. “Performances took place in daylight, starting early in the morning. There was of course no stage lighting. Because of all this, and because it had from the very start been part of the tradition, all the actors wore masks. All the roles, both male and female, were taken by men. A few Greek tragedies seem to have dealt with contemporary events, but the majority were concerned with legend- many dramatized material linked to Homer. In one instance, we can see how each of the three great Greek tragic dramatists, Aeschylus (525-456 BC), Sophocles (497-406/5 BC), and Euripides (485-406 BC), dealt with the same plot- Orestes’s return from exile to avenge the murder of his father Agamemnon, after the conclusion of the Trojan War” (68-69).

3. “Greek tragedies have some striking peculiarities- for example, all violent events, such as the killings of Clytemnestra and Aegisthus, take place off-stage, and are described for the audience; the drama thus lives in language at least as much as it does in action. In addition, the plays generally deal with events whose outcome is already known to the audience; everything that happens is preordained. In many cases the dramatists seem to have used this to give their work a special overtone. The background to both Electras, for instance, is the unending fratricidal struggle of the Peloponnesian War between Athens and Sparta (531-404 BC). Euripides’s text, in particular, is shot through with an oblique commentary on what was happening, and the brutalizing effect which it had on his fellow Athenians” (69).

4. “A play by Aristophanes is something like a modern revue- a loosely connected series of sketches and comic turns. He lampoons the leading politicians of his time, satirizes personalities such as Socrates, and parodies the great tragic playwrights, especially Euripides. Many things in Aristophanes’s plays seem also to be based on what had become another form of popular entertainment- the proceedings of the Athenian lawcourts. The actual story is usually episodic, and often relies on some kind of quest, in which the central figure embodies the reactions of the ordinary citizen. Paradoxically, in one of Aristophanes’s best plays, The Frogs, the ordinary citizen is also a god. The play describes how Dionysius, worried by the lack of tragic playwrights, sets out to rescue Euripides, then only recently dead, form Hades. In the end, however, he convicts Euripides of sophistry, quoting well-known lines from his plays, and decides to rescue Aeschylus instead, as an emblem of the good old days” (69).

5. “The background to Aristophanes’s plays is, once again, the bitterness of the Peloponnesian War. The Frogs was written just before the final collapse of Athens… In Athens, the public was now weary of politics, and less socially diversified than formerly, because the poor had been denied the vote, and were now separated from the prosperous middle class, to the point where they no longer attended theatrical performances” (69).

M Philoxenos of Eretria. Battle of Issus (Pompeii), Roman copy of a Greek painting of c. 310 BCE, mosaictesserae/ cast shadows (skiagraphia)/ Philoxenes and Pliny/ the Battle of Issus/ Alexander the Great and Darius III/ Hephaestion

1. “Greek painting has so far been discussed only in terms of pottery decoration because little remains of paintings in other mediums” (Stokstad, Art History 205). “Later, Roman patrons greatly admired Greek murals and commissioned copies, as either wall paintings or mosaics, to decorate their homes. These copies provide another source of evidence about fourth-century BCE Greek painting… A second-century BCE mosaic, Alexander the Great Confronts Darius III at the Battle of Issos , was based on an original wall painting of about 310 BCE. Pliny the Elder attributed the original to Philoxenos of Eretria; a recent theory claimed it was by a well-known woman painter, Helen of Egypt” (206).

2. “This scene is one of violent action, gestures, and radical foreshortening, all devised to elicit the viewer’s response to a dramatic situation. Astride a horse at the left, his hair blowing free and his neck bare, Alexander challenges the helmeted and armored Persian leader, who stretches out his arm in a gesture of defeat and apprehension as his charioteer whisks him back toward safety in the Persian ranks. Presumably in close imitation of the original painting, the mosaicist create the illusion of solid figures through modeling, mimicking the play of light on three-dimensional surfaces by touching protrusions with highlights and shading undercut areas and areas in shadow” (207).

3. “The Greek term for shading was skiagraphia (literally, shadow painting), and it was said to have been invented by an Athenian painter of the fifth century BC named Apollodoros” (Kleiner, Mamiya, and Tansey 144-145). “In the Alexander Mosaic, tesserae (tiny stones or pieces of glass cut to the desired size and shape) were employed instead of pebbles” (145). “Philoxenos’s painting is notable for its technical mastery of problems that had long fascinated Greek painters… Everywhere men, animals, and weapons cast shadows on the ground” (145).

Unit TWO: Late Classical Art STUDY GUIDE

55

Philoxenos of Eretria. Battle of Issus (Pompeii), Roman copy of a Greek painting of c. 310 BCE, mosaic (CONTINUED)

4. “The background is empty, articulated only by lances held aloft and a blighted tree, which balances Darius in the composition. Except for the debris of battle, the foreground is equally empty. Attention concentrates on the figures, modeled with foreshortening and bold use of light and shade. Persian garments are rendered accurately in fourth-century terms, a strong suggestion that the mosaic is a reliable facsimile of Philoxenos’s painting” (Pedley 307).

5. “The picture follows the four-color scheme (yellow, red, black, and white) that is known to have been widely used at that time. The crowding, air of frantic excitement, the powerfully modeled and foreshortened forms, and the precise

shadows make the scene far more complicated and dramatic than any other work of Greek art from the period” (Janson 136). 6. “The more we examine the details of this picture, the more it appears a masterpiece not of realism, but imaginative propaganda. Alexander fights on recklessly without his helmet: he is wide-eyed and, although in the act of spearing a member of the Persian cavalry, obviously intent on attacking the Persian king himself. Darius, however, has wheeled his chariot round. The tall lances of his numerous troops are shouldered for retreat. He turns, horror-struck, to glimpse the hero-warrior sowing panic among his bodyguards. He is a study in the loss of nerve… The costumes look authentic, but when examined closely, those of the Persians are suspiciously ornate and effeminate (the horseman being speared by Alexander wear s earrings and sequined trousers, for example)” (Spivey 319-320).

7. After the battle of Issus, “Darius fled, leaving his purse and his family behind him, to be treated the one with gratitude, the other with chivalry. After peaceably taking Damascus and Sidon Alexander laid siege to Tyre, which was harboring a large Phoenician squadron in the pay of Persia” (Durant, Life of Greece 544). Marching back into Asia, “hardly stopping to rest at Susa, he marched over mountains in the depth of winter to seize Persepolis; and so rapidly did he move that he was in Darius’ palace before the Persians could conceal the royal treasury. Here again his good judgment left him, and he burned the magnificent city to the ground. His soldiers looted the houses, ravaged the women, and killed the men” (545-546).

8. Later Alexander’s “strong frame had been weakened by exposure and drink… While the army was in Ecbatana his dearest companion, Hephaestion, fell sick and died. Alexander had loved him so much that when Darius’ queen, entering the conqueror’s tent, bowed first to Hephaestion, thinking him Alexander, the young King said, graciously, ‘Hephaestion is also Alexander’ – as if to say that he and Hephaestion were one. The two often shared one tent, and drank from one cup; in battle they fought side by side. Now the King, feeling that half of him had been torn away, broke down in uncontrolled grief. He lay for hours upon the corpse, weeping; he cut off his hair in mourning, and for days refused to take food. He sentenced to death the physician who had left the sick youth’s side to attend the public games. He ordered a gigantic funeral pile to be erected in Hephaestion’s memory, at a cost, we are told, of ten thousand talents, and sent to inquire of the oracle of Ammon whether it was permitted to worship Hephaestion as a god. In his next campaign a whole tribe was slain, at his orders, as a sacrifice to Hephaestion’s ghost. The thought that Achilles had not long survived Patroclus haunted him like a sentence of death” (551).

9. “Back in Babylon, he abandoned himself more and more to drink. One night, reveling with his officers, he proposed a drinking match. Promachus quaffed twelve quarts of wine, and won the prize, a talent; three days later he died. Shortly afterward, at another banquet, Alexander drained a goblet containing six quarts of wine. On the next night he drank heavily again; and cold weather suddenly setting in, he caught a fever, and took to his bed. The fever raged for ten days, during which Alexander continued to give orders to his army and his fleet. On the eleventh day he died, being in the thirty-third year of his age. When his generals asked him to whom he left his empire he answered, ‘To the

Unit TWO: Hellenistic Greek Art STUDY GUIDE

56

B Stoa of Attalos II (Athens), c. 150 BCEHellenistic period/ stoa/ agora/ colonnades of the stoa

1. “The kingdom of Pergamon, a breakaway state within the Seleucid realm, established itself in the early third century BCE on the site of an ancient city in western Asia Minor. It quickly became a leading center of arts patronage and the hub of a new sculptural style that had far-reaching influence throughout the Hellenistic period” (Stokstad, Art History 211).

2. “The east side of the Agora saw the construction of the Stoa of Attalos, King of Pergamon from 159 to 138 BC, a gift from him and his wife to the Athenians. A large, two-storied structure, it was purpose-built for shopping. There were twenty-one shops behind the double colonnade on each floor, so forty-two in all. Marble- for the façade and the columns- and limestone were the materials used. There was wide spacing of the columns for ease of access and to accommodate crowds, and variety in the use of the orders. Doric was used for the exterior on the ground level, Ionic for the interior. On the second level, Ionic columns on the exterior were linked by a balustrade, while the interior colonnade introduced a new capital type called Pergamene, which was derived from the Egyptian palm capital” (Pedley 326-327). “Columns of the interior colonnades were left unfluted, as was the lower part of the Doric colonnade, since commercial traffic was likely to damage the flutes. Enough of the stoa was preserved in later structures for it to be accurately restored. It now serves as a museum” (327).

3. The Athens Agora or marketplace, “which has been extensively excavated and studied, was situated at the foot of the Acropolis. It began as an unadorned open square where farmers and artisans displayed their wares. Over time, various public and private structures were erected around and within its perimeter on both sides of the Panathenaic Way, a ceremonial road used during an important festival in honor of Athena” (Stokstad 185).

4. “Among the religious structures were a good-sized temple to Hephaistos, the god of the forge; an altar to the Twelve Gods (local deities not to be confused with the great gods of Mount Olympos); and a shrine that may have honored the Eponymous Heroes, the legendary ancestors of the Athenians. The Agora was home to the Athens city mint, its military headquarters, and two buildings devoted to court business. One of these was a large hall where the dikasts, who acted as both judges and jury, tried major cases. The other was a lesser court where the heliaia, a group of citizens selected by the drawing of lots, decided civil and criminal cases. Thanks to a reform by Perikles, the heliaia were paid for their services like modern jurors” (185-186).

5. “The Painted Stoa, built on the north side of the Athens Agora about 460 BCE, was so called because it was decorated with paintings by the most famous artists of the time, including Polygnotos of Thasos (active c. 475-450 BCE). Nothing survives of Polygnotos’s work, but his contemporaries praised him for his ability to create the illusion of spatial recession in landscapes” (186). “In the Athens Agora, the 500-member boule, or council, met in a building called the bouleuterion. This structure, built before 450 BCE, was laid out on a simple rectangular megaron plan with a vestibule and a large meeting room. Near the end of the fifth century BCE, a new bouleuterion was constructed to the west of the old one. This too had a rectangular plan. The interior, however, may have had permanent tiered seating arranged in an ascending semicircle around a ground-level podium, or raised platform, as in the outdoor theaters of the time” (186).

A The Hellenistic Period

1. “When Alexander died in 323 BCE, he left a vast empire with no administrative structure and no accepted successor. Almost at once his generals turned against one another, local leaders tried to regain their lost autonomy, and the empire began to break apart. The Greek city-states formed a new mutual-protection league but never again achieved significant power. Democracy survived in form but no substance in governments dominated by local rulers” (Stokstad, Art History 209).

2. “By the early third century BCE, three major powers had emerged out of the chaos, ruled by three of Alexander’s generals and their heirs: Antigonus, Ptolemy, and Seleucus. The Antigonids controlled Macedonia and mainland Greece; the Ptolemies ruled Egypt; and the Seleucids controlled Asia Minor, Mesopotamia, and Persia. Over the course of the second and first centuries BCE these kingdoms succumbed to the growing empire centered in Rome. Ptolemaic Egypt endured the longest, almost two and one-half centuries. The death in 30 BCE of its last ruler, the remarkable Cleopatra, marks the end of the Hellenistic period” (209).

3. “Alexander’s most lasting legacy was the spread of Greek culture far beyond its original borders. The Ptolemaic capital, Alexandria in Egypt, a prosperous seaport known for its lighthouse (another of the Seven Wonders of the World, according to ancient writers), emerged as a great Hellenistic center of learning and the arts. Its library, estimated to have contained 700,000 papyrus and parchment scrolls, was rivaled only by the library at Pergamon in Asia Minor” (209).

4. “Artists of the Hellenistic period had a vision noticeably different from that of their predecessors. Where earlier artists sought the ideal and the general, Hellenistic artists sought the individual and the specific. They turned increasingly away from the heroic to the everyday, from gods to mortals, from aloof serenity to individual emotion, and from drama to melodramatic pathos. A trend introduced in the fourth century BCE- the appeal to the senses through lustrous or glittering surface treatments and to the emotions with dramatic subjects and poses- became more pronounced. Even the architecture of the Hellenistic period largely reflected the contemporary taste for high drama” (209).

Unit TWO: Hellenistic Greek Art STUDY GUIDE

57

C Altar of Zeus (Pergamon, Turkey), c. 175 BCEAttalos I and the Gauls/ gigantomachy/ Pergamon in Asia Minor/high relief/ violent movement

1. “In the Great Altar of Zeus erected at Pergamon, the Hellenistic taste for emotion, energetic movement, and exaggerated musculature is translated into relief sculpture. The two friezes on the altar celebrated the city and its superiority over the Gauls, who were a constant threat to the Pergamenes. Inside the structure, a small frieze depicted the legendary founding of Pergamon” (Adams, Art Across Time 186).

2. “Outside, the traditional depiction of the gods fighting the Titans was transformed. In a detail illustrating Athena’s destruction of Alkyoneus, a son of the Titan earth goddess Gaia (Apollo’s predecessor at Delphi), the energy inherent in the juxtaposed diagonal planes seems barely contained. This mythical battle between pre-Greek Titans and Greek Olympians recurs in Hellenistic art partly as a result of renewed political threats to Greek supremacy. But unlike the Classical version on the Parthenon metopes, that at Pergamon is full of melodrama, frenzy, and pathos. King Attalus I defeated the powerful Gauls, who invaded Pergamon in 238 BC. This victory made Pergamon a major political force. Later, under the rule of Eumenes II (197-c. 160 BC) the monumental altar dedicated to Zeus was built to proclaim the victory of Greek civilization over the barbarians. Greece tried to reassert its superiority, as Athens had done in building the Parthenon following the Persian Wars. But Hellenistic art, especially in its late phase, reflects uncertainty and turmoil of the period. By the end of the first century BC, the Romans were in complete control of the Mediterranean world and, with the ascendancy of Augustus in 31 BC, the scene was set for the beginning of the Roman Empire” (186).

3. Eumenes II had the enormous altar “built on a hill above the city to commemorate the victory of Rome and her allies over Antiochos the Great of Syria eight years before (a victory that had given him much of the Seleucid Empire). A large part of the sculptural decoration has been recovered, and the entire west front of the monument, with the great flight of stairs leading to its entrance, has been reconstructed in Berlin… Its boldest feature is the frieze covering the base, which is 400 feet long and more than 7 feet tall. The huge figures, cut so deep that they seem almost detached from the background, have the scale and weight of pedimental statues, but they have been freed from the confining triangular frame and place in a frieze” (Janson 144).

4. “The muscular bodies rush at each other, and the high relief creates strong accents of light and dark. The beating wings and windblown garments are almost overwhelming in their dynamism. A writing movement pervades the entire design, down to the last lock of hair, linking the figures in a single continuous rhythm. This sense of unity restrains the violence of the struggle and keeps it- just barely- form exploding its architectural frame. Indeed, the action spills out onto the stairs, where several figures are locked in combat” (144).

“The victory of the gods is meant to symbolize Eumenes’ own victories. Such translations of history into mythology had been common in Greek art for a long time. But to place Eumenes in analogy with the gods themselves implies an exaltation of the ruler that is Oriental rather than Greek. The analogy was reinforced by a second frieze, entirely different in character, along the interior wall of the altar, which depicted the life of Telephos, the legendary founder of Pergamon and the son of Herakles, who was born of Zeus. After the time of Mausolos (who may have been the first to introduce it on Greek soil), the idea of divine kingship had been adopted by Alexander the Great and the lesser sovereigns who divided up his realm, including the rulers of Pergamon. It later became central to

D Epigonos (?). Dying Gaul, Roman copy of a bronze original from Pergamon, c. 230-220 BCE, marbletheatrical moving, and noble representations of an enemy/ pathos/ tubicen with a torque

1. The new Pergamene style “is illustrated by a group of sculpture from a monument commemorating the victory in 230 BCE of Attalos I (ruled 241-197 BCE) over the Gauls, a Celtic people who invaded from the north. These figures, originally in bronze but known today only from Roman copies in marble, were mounted on a large pedestal. They depict the murder-suicide of the Gallic chieftain and his wife and the slow demise of a wounded soldier-trumpeter, extolling their dignity and heroism in defeat. Their wiry, unkempt hair and the trumpeter’s twisted neck ring, or torque (the only item of dress the Celts wore in battle), identify them as ‘barbarians.’ The artist has sought to arouse the viewer’s admiration and pity for his subjects. The chieftain, for example, still supports his dead wife as he plunges the sword into his own breast. The trumpeter, fatally injured, struggles to stay up, but the slight bowing of his supporting right arm and his unseeing downcast gaze indicate that he is on the point of death” (Stokstad, Art History 211).

2. “Pliny the Elder described a work like the Dying Gallic Trumpeter, attributing it to an artist named Epigonos. Recent research indicates that Epigonos probably knew the early-fifth-century BCE sculpture of the Temple of Aphaia at Aegina, which included the Dying Warrior, and could have had it in mind when he created his own works” (212).

Unit TWO: Hellenistic Greek Art STUDY GUIDE

58

E Nike of Samothrace, c. 190 BCE, marblesuggestion of movement/ effect of statuary amplified by its setting

1. “The Winged Nike, also known as the Winged Victory, from Samothrace and the Old Market Woman are further sculptural examples of the contrast between the vigor and the weight of old age. The Nike is represented as if alighting on the prow of a ship to commemorate a naval victory. The wind whips her draperies with a sense of movement more activated than in Classical sculpture, and her wings are outspread in triumph. The forward diagonal of her torso seems forced against the elements, and the position of her wings suggests that they have not yet settled. Adding to the sense of movement are the drapery masses sweeping across the front of the body, which are contrasted with the seemingly transparent drapery at the torso. The more deeply cut folds also increase the areas of shadow in the skirt swirling around her legs, making it appear darker as well as heavier than the drapery covering her torso. From the side, the diagonal planes of the body and the outspread wings come into view” (Adams, Art Across Time 183).

2. “The wind-whipped costume and raised wings of this victory goddess indicate that she has just alighted on the prow of the stone ship that formed the original base of the statue. The work probably memorialized an important naval victory, perhaps the Rhodian triumph over the Seleucid king Antiochus III in 190 BCE. Lacking its head and arms, the Nike and a fragment of its ship base were discovered in the ruins of the Sanctuary of the Great Gods by a French explorer in 1863. Soon after, it entered the collection of the Louvre Museum in Paris. Poised high on the landing of the grand staircase, this famous Hellenistic sculpture continues to catch the eye and the imagination of thousands of museum visitors” (Stokstad, Art History 214).

3. “In its original setting- in a hillside niche high above the city of Samothrace and perhaps drenched with spray from a fountain- this 8-foot high goddess of victory must have reminded the Samothracians of the god-character in Greek plays who descends from heaven to determine the outcome of the drama. The fact that victory in real life does often seem miraculous makes this image of a goddess alighting suddenly on a ship breathtakingly appropriate for a war memorial. The forward momentum of the Nike’s heavy body is balanced by the powerful backward thrust of its enormous wings. The large, open

movements of the figure, the strong contrasts of light and dark on the deeply sculptured forms, and the contrasting textures of feathers, fabric, and skin are reminiscent of the sculptures on the Altar of Zeus at Pergamon, though it is not known which work is earlier” (215).

F Alexandros of Antioch-on-the-Meander. Venus de Milo (Melos, Greece), c. 150-125 BCE, marbleteasing the spectator

1. The Aphrodite of Melos (Venus de Milo) “is over lifesize (around 6 feet 8 inches tall), and stands with the left leg sharply forward, bent at the knee and turning. The Praxitelean S-curve rises through the body, while the drapery is suggestively poised. The face is late Classical in type, as is the anatomy. Though the proportions are changed and she is higher-waisted than the Aphrodite of Knidos, the similarity is nonetheless there. The new proportions, the twisting spiral of the figure between feet and hips, he precarious drapery introduce new and distinctly Hellenistic notes,

but the influence of the Classical order is clear” (Pedley 343).

2. “The original appearance of this famous statue’s missing arms has been much debated. When it was dug up in a field in 1820, some broken pieces found with it (now lost) indicated that the figure was holding out an apple in its right hand. Many judged these fragments to be part of a later restoration, not part of the original statue. The image of Aphrodite admiring herself in the highly polished shield of the war god Ares was popular in the second century BCE, so this figure could have been holding a shield. If so, it would have been off to one side, tilted at an angle, and probably resting on the goddess’s left thigh. This theoretical ‘restoration’ seems to offer an explanation for the pronounced S-curve of the pose and the otherwise unnatural forward projection of the knee” (Stokstad, Art History 218).

3. “The sensuous juxtaposition of nude flesh with the texture of draperies, which seem about to slip off the figure, adds a G Seated boxer (Rome), c. 100-50 BCE, bronzeusing art to appeal to the emotions rather than the intellect/ addressing the subject of defeat

1. “The bronze boxer from around the turn of the first century BC reveals the ravaging effects of this violent and brutal sport. His face, turned awkwardly over his right shoulder, is covered with scars. He wears the leather knuckle-straps worn by Greek boxers which inflicted serious injury on one’s opponents. He himself has a broken nose and teeth, as well as ears that have suffered from years of beating. His arms are still muscular, but his ribs are beginning to protrude from his chest, indicating the sagging flesh of age.

Neither the function nor context of this figure is known, but it shows a man who has weathered a lifetime of fighting in a realistic, rather than an idealized, way” (Adams, Art Across Time 184).

Unit TWO: Hellenistic Greek Art STUDY GUIDE

59

H Polyeuktos. Demosthenes, Roman copy after a bronze original of c. 280 BCE, marbleusing art to capture a likeness and personality/ Demosthenes/ realistic depiction vs. an idealized one

1. “This statue was one of several Athenian heroes opposed to the Macedonian rule of Athens that was set up in the agora, or marketplace, of the city. Demosthenes was forced by the Macedonians to flee Athens. When he reached the island of Poros, he drank poison rather than submit to the enemy. An inscription on the base of the sculpture reads: ‘If your strength had equaled your resolution, Demosthenes, the Macedonian Ares [i.e. Alexander the Great] would have never ruled the Greeks’” (Adams, Art Across Time 182).

2. “The full-length portrait of the orator Demosthenes by Polyeuktos, also a Roman copy, is an example of Hellenistic interest in character. Demosthenes’ life was beset by difficulties, including his financial hardship and a speech impediment. He was a serious stutterer as a young man, but he trained himself to become the greatest public speaker in Athens. His political enemies succeeded in having him exiled from Athens on a trumped-up charge of corruption. In Polyeuktos’ rendition, Demosthenes is an elderly, haggard man, with long, thin arms. His dejection shows on his face and an inner tension is conveyed by the agitation of his hands. The difficulties of his life are an integral part of the statue, which endows the portrait with a new, biographical accuracy” (183).

I Athanadoros, Hagesandros, and Polydoros of Rhodes. Laocoon and his sons (Rome) early 1st century CE, marbleVirgil’s Aeneid/ Laocoon/ art as a theatrical device

1. “The Hellenistic interest in melodramatic pathos is again evident in the sculptural group of Laocoön and his Sons, a Roman adaptation of a Hellenistic work. It depicts an incident from the end of the Trojan War, in which Laocoön and his sons are devoured by a pair of serpents. The choice of such a moment lends itself to the Hellenistic taste for violent movement. The zigzags and strenuous exertions of the human figures are bound by the snakes winding around them” (Adams, Art Across Time 184).

2. “Estimates of the date of this work vary widely- from the 2nd century BC to the 1st century AD- and there is a debate over whether it is a later copy of an earlier original or a later original in an earlier style” (185).

3. “Laocoön was the priest who was punished by the gods for telling the Trojans not to admit the Greeks’ wooden horse into the city. His warning went unheeded, which led to the Trojans’ defeat. Today we tend to find the pathos of the group somewhat calculated, and its surface finish strikes us merely as a display of virtuoso technique. In style, including the relieflike spread of the three figures, it clearly descends from the Pergamon frieze. Here, though, the dynamism has become rather self-conscious. The Laocoön was long thought to be a Greek original and was identified with a group by Agesander, Athenodoros, and Polydoros of Rhodes that the Roman writer Pliny mentions as being in the palace of the emperor Titus” (Janson 147).

4. “The subject must have held a special meaning for the Romans. Laocoön’s fate forewarned Aeneas of the fall of Troy, prompting him to flee in time. Since Aeneas was believed to have come to Italy an to have been the ancestor of Romulus and Remus, the death of Laocoön could be viewed as the first link in a chain of events that ultimately led to the founding of Rome” (147). “It may be that the commission to make the copy came directly as a result of the popularity of the epic poem celebrating Rome’s Trojan origins, Virgil’s Aeneid” (Spivey 375).

J Hellenistic Realism

1. “A marble statue a little over 4 feet tall, which has long been called Market Woman, may represent a peasant woman on her way to the agora with three chickens and a basket of vegetables. Despite the bunched an untidy way the figure’s dress hangs, it appears to be of an elegant design and made of fine fabric. The hair too bears some semblance of a once-careful arrangement. These characteristics, along with the woman’s sagging lower jaw, unfocused stare, and lack of concern for her exposed breasts, have led some to speculate that she may represent an aging, dissolute follower of the wine god Dionysos on her way to make an offering” (Stokstad, Art History 217).

2. “For the first time in Greek art, artists began to depict the qualities of old age that are apparent here- a bent and bony frame, wrinkled skin, sunken cheeks, and sagging breasts” (Adams, Art Across Time 184).

60

61

62