Hartdes - Ancient Greece by Pm - Part 1

8/6/2019 Hartdes - Ancient Greece by Pm - Part 1

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Ancient Greece: Classical Period

BRIEF HISTORY

The term ancient Greece refers to the period of Greek history lasting from the Greek Dark Ages ca. 1100 and the Dorian invasion, to 146 BC and the Roman conquest of Greece after the battle of Corinth. generally considered to be the seminal culture which provided the foundation of Western civilization. Greculture had a powerful influence on the Roman Empire, which carried a version of it to many parts ofEuroThe civilization of the ancient Greeks has been immensely influential on the language, politics, educatiosystems, philosophy, science, and arts, giving rise to the Renaissance in Western Europe and again resurg

during various neo-Classical revivals in 18th and 19th century Europe and the Americas.

I. Art in Ancient Greece

The art of ancient Greece has exercised an enormous influence on the culture of many countries francient times until the present, particularly in the areas ofsculpture and architecture. In the West, the arthe Roman Empire was largely derived from Greek models. In the East, Alexander the Great's conquests initiaseveral centuries of exchange between Greek, Central Asian and Indian cultures, resulting in Greco-Buddhist with ramifications as far as Japan. Following the Renaissance in Europe, the humanist aesthetic and the htechnical standards of Greek art inspired generations of European artists. Well into the 19th century, classical tradition derived from Greece dominated the art of the western world.

The art of Ancient Greece is usually divided stylistically into four periods: the Geometric, Archaic, Classicand Hellenistic. As noted above, the Geometric age is usually dated from about 1000 BC, although in reality l

is known about art in Greece during the preceding 200 years (traditionally known as the Dark Ages), the perof the 7th century BC witnessed the slow development of the Archaic style as exemplified by the black-figstyle of vase painting. The onset ofthe Persian Wars (480 BC to 448 BC) is usually taken as the dividing between the Archaic and the Classical periods, and the reign of Alexander the Great (336 BC to 323 BCtaken as separating the Classical from the Hellenistic periods.

In reality, there was no sharp transition from one period to another. Forms of art developed at differespeeds in different parts of the Greek world, and as in any age some artists worked in more innovatstyles than others. Strong local traditions, conservative in character, and the requirements of local cuenable historians to locate the origins even of displaced works of art.

II. Climatic

The climate was intermediate between rigorous cold and relaxing heat. The clear atmosphere aintensity of light was conducive to the development of that love of precise and exact forms which special attributes of Greek architecture. The administration of Justice, dramatic representations, and most puceremonies took place in the open air, even in winter, and to this largely due the limited variety of pubbuildings other than temples. The hot summer sun and sudden winter showers, together with the Greek loveconversation probably explain the porticoes and colonnades which were such important features.

*porticoes - a porch or walkway with a roof supported by columns, often leading to the entrance of a building

* colonnades - 1. A series of columns placed at regular intervals. 2. A structure composed of columns placedregular intervals.

SCULPTURESMost Greek sculptures were painted in strong colours. The paint was frequently limited to parts depictclothing, hair, and so on, with the skin left in the natural colour of the stone, but it could also covsculptures in their totality. The painting of Greek sculpture should not merely be seen as an enhancementheir sculpted form, but has the characteristics of a distinct style of art. For example, the pedimesculptures from the Temple of Aphaia on Aegina have recently been demonstrated to have been painwith bold and elaborate patterns, depicting, amongst other details, patterned clothing. The polychromy of ststatues was paralleled by the use of different materials to distinguish skin, clothing and other detailschryselephantine sculptures, and by the use of different metals to depict lips, etc, on high-quality bronlike the Riace Warriors.


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Reconstructed colour scheme on a Trojan archer from the Temple of Aphaia, Aegina.

Reconstruction of the chryselephantine statue of Athena Parthenos from the Parthenon, on display in the Parthenon replica at Nashville

The Warriors in their current location.

I. Figurines

Terracotta figurines

Bell Idol 7th C. BC, Louvre.

Clay is a material frequently used for the making of votive statuettes or idols, since well before Minocivilization until the Hellenistic era and beyond. During the 8th century BC., in Boeotia, one fimanufactured "Bell Idols", female statuettes with mobile legs: the head, small compared to the remaindethe body, is perched at the end of a long neck, while the body is very full, in the shape of bell. At the beginnof 8th century BC., tombs known as "hero's" receive hundreds, even thousands of small figurines, wrudimentary figuration, generally representing characters with the raised arms, i.e. gods in apotheosi

In later periods the terracotta figurines lose their religious nature, representing from then on charact

from everyday life. With 4th and 3rd centuries BC., a type known as Tanagra figurines shows a refin
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art. Tanagra figurines often preserve extensive traces of surface paint. At the same time, cities Alexandria, Smyrna or Tarsus produced an abundance of grotesque figurines, representing individuwith deformed members, eyes bulging and contorting themselves. Such figurines were also made from bronz

Metal figurines

8th century BC votive horse from Olympia (Louvre).

Figurines made ofmetal, primarily bronze, are an extremely common find at early Greek sanctuariesOlympia, where thousands of such objects, mostly depicting animals, have been found. They are usuaproduced in the lost wax technique and can be considered the initials stage in the development of Grebronze sculpture. The most common motifs during the Geometric period were horses and deer, but docattle and other animals are also depicted. Human figures occur occasionally. The production of smmetal votives continued throughout Greek antiquity. In the Classical and Hellenistic periods, moelaborate bronze statuettes, closely connected with monumental sculpture, also became common.

II. Monumental Sculptures

Those who practiced the visual arts, including sculpture, were held in low regard in ancient Greece, viewedmere manual labourers. Plutarch (Life of Pericles, II) said "we admire the work of art but despise the makeit"; this was a common view in the ancient world. Ancient Greek art today is often categorised in three epoc"Archaic", "Classical" and "Hellenic".

Materials, forms

Ancient Greek sculptures were mostly made oftwo types of material. Stone, especially marble or other higquality limestones was used most frequently and carved by hand with metal tools. Stone sculptures cobe free-standing fully carved in the round (statues), or only partially carved reliefs still attached to a backgrouplaque, for example in architectural friezes or grave stelai.

Bronze statues were ofhigher status, but have survived in far smaller numbers, due to the reusability

metals. They were usually made in the lost wax technique. Chryselephantine, or gold-and-ivory, statoften adorned temples and were regarded as the highest form of sculpture, but virtually none hsurvived.

*lost wax technique - probably invented in ancient China or Egypt. The technique consists ofcarvingwax replica of an item that is to be duplicated in gold. The wax is invested (imbedded) in plasterclay and burned out leaving an image (hole) where the wax used to be. Then the image is filled w

molten gold through a small hole in the investment.

Late Archaic terracotta statue of Zeus and Ganymede, Olympia Archaeological Museum.

Terracotta was occasionally employed, for large statuary. Few examples of this survived, at least partidue to the fragility of such statues. The best known exception to this is a statue of Zeus carryGanymede found at Olympia, executed around 470 BC. In this case, the terracotta is painted.

CLASSICAL
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Bronze Sculpture, thought to be either Poseidon or Zeus, c. 460 B.C, National Archaeological Museum, Athens. This masterpiece oclassical sculpture was found by fishermen in their nets off the coast of Cape Artemisium in 1928. The figure is more than 2 m in heig

In the Classical period there was a revolution in Greek statuary, usually associated with the introductof democracy and the end of the aristocratic culture associated with the kouroi. The Classical persaw changes in the style and function of sculpture. Poses became more naturalistic (see Charioteer of Delphi for an example of the transition to more naturalistic sculpture), and the techniskill of Greek sculptors in depicting the human form in a variety of poses greatly increased. From ab500 BC statues began to depict real people. The statues ofHarmodius and Aristogeiton set up in Athto mark the overthrow of the tyranny were said to be the first public monuments to actual people

Charioteer of Dephi Harmodius and Aristogeiton

At the same time sculpture and statues were put to wider uses. The great temples of the Classical era sas the Parthenon in Athens, and the Temple of Zeus at Olympia, required relief sculpture

decorative friezes, and sculpture in the round to fill the triangular fields of the pediments. The difficaesthetic and technical challenge stimulated much in the way of sculptural innovation. Unfortunatthese works survive only in fragments, the most famous of which are the Parthenon Marbles, half of whare in the British Museum.

Temple of Zeus

Funeral statuary evolved during this period from the rigid and impersonal kouros of the Archaic period to highly personal family groups of the Classical period. These monuments are commonly found in suburbs of Athens, which in ancient times were cemeteries on the outskirts of the city. Although some

them depict "ideal" types the mourning mother, the dutiful son they increasingly depicted real peop
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typically showing the departed taking his dignified leave from his family. They are among the most intimaand affecting remains of the Ancient Greeks.

Family group on a grave marker from Athens, National Archaeological Museum, Athens

In the Classical period for the first time we know the names of individual sculptors. Phidias oversaw the desand building of the Parthenon. Praxiteles made the female nude respectable for the first time in the LClassical period (mid 4th century): his Aphrodite of Knidos, which survives in copies, was said by Pliny tothe greatest statue in the world.

The greatest works of the Classical period, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia and the Statue of AtheParthenos (both chryselephantine and executed by Phidias or under his direction), are lost, although smacopies (in other materials) and good descriptions of both still exist. Their size and magnificence prompemperors to seize them in the Byzantine period, and both were removed to Constantinople, where they w

later destroyed in fire.

Zeus at Olmpia

Copy of Polyclitus' Diadumenos, National Archaeological Museum, Athens.

So-called Venus Braschi by Praxiteles, type of the Knidian Aphrodite, Munich Glyptothek.

The Marathon Youth, 4th century BC bronze statue, possibly by Praxiteles, National Archaeological Museum, Athens.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Aphrodite_Braschi_Glyptothek_Munich_258.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:NAMA_X15118_Marathon_Boy_3.JPGhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Aphrodite_Braschi_Glyptothek_Munich_258.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Diadoumenos-Atenas.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:0025MAN-Relief2.jpg


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Hermes, possibly by Lysippos, National Archaeological Museum, Athens.

Architecture

Painting was also used to enhance the visual aspects of architecture. Certain parts of the superstructof Greek temples were habitually painted since the Archaic period. Such architectural polychromy (multcolors in one entity) could take the form ofbright colours directly applied to the stone (evidenced eg. on Parthenon, or of elaborate patterns, frequently architectural members made of terracotta (Archaic examplesOlympia and Delphi).

Reconstructed colour scheme of the entablature on a Doric temple.

The Parthenon

Architecture (building executed to an aesthetically considered design) was extinct in Greece from the endthe Mycenaean period (about 1200 BC) until the 7th century, when urban life and prosperity recovered tpoint where public building could be undertaken. But since most Greek buildings in the Archaic and EaClassical periods were made ofwood or mud-brick, nothing remains of them except a few ground-plans, there are almost no written sources on early architecture or descriptions of buildings. Most of our knowledgeGreek architecture comes from the few surviving buildings of the Classical, Hellenistic and Roman perio(since Roman architecture heavily copied Greek), and from late written sources such as Vitruvius (1st centAD). This means that there is a strong bias towards temples, the only buildings which survive in any numb

The standard format of Greek public buildings is well known from surviving examples such as the Parthenon, aeven more so from Roman buildings built partly on the Greek model, such as the Pantheon in Rome. Tbuilding was usually either a cube or a rectangle made from limestone, of which Greece has an abundanand which was cut into large blocks and dressed. Marble was an expensive building material in Greehigh quality marble came only from Mt Pentelus in Attica and from a few islands such as Paros, andtransportation in large blocks was difficult. It was used mainly for sculptural decoration, not structuraexcept in the very grandest buildings of the Classical period such as the Parthenon.

The Erechtheion on the Acropolis of Athens, late 5th century BC.
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The Temple of Hephaistos at Athens, late 5th century BC.

The theatre of Epidauros, 4th century BC.

The walls of Messene: Hellenistic defensive architecture.

A. Basic Architectural Types

I. The Stonehenge in Salisbury Plain is an example of the very basic Post and LintelConstruction.

II. The Basic Post and Lintel is the basis for Greek Construction.

There were two main styles (or "orders") of Greek architecture, the Doric and the Ionic. These names wused by the Greeks themselves, and reflected their belief that the styles descended from the Dorian aIonian Greeks of the Dark Ages, but this is unlikely to be true. The more ornate Corinthian style walater development of the Ionic. These styles are best known through the three orders of column capitals, there are differences in most points of design and decoration between the orders.

The three main types of columns used in Greek temples and other public buildings are Doric, Ionic, aCorinthian. The truest and most basic difference among the orders has to do with proportions (Docolumns, for example, being thicker and shorter, Ionic columns taller and slimmer). As a shortcut, orders may be distinguished most easily by their capitals (the tops of the columns). As you can see from following examples, the Doric capital has the simplest design; the Ionic has the curlicues called volutand the Corinthian has the acanthus leaves:

Doric Capital Ionic Capital CorinthianCapital
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Hephaistos.temple.AC.02.jpghttp://academic.reed.edu/humanities/110Tech/graphics/CorinthianCapital.JPGhttp://academic.reed.edu/humanities/110Tech/graphics/IonicCapital.GIFhttp://academic.reed.edu/humanities/110Tech/graphics/DoricCapital.JPGhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Messene_01.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:07Epidaurus_Theater07.jpghttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Hephaistos.temple.AC.02.jpg


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Terms to remember:

Cornice the crowning or upper portion of the entablature, also used for any crowning protection

Frieze the middle division of the classic entablature

Architrave the beam or lowest division of the entablature, which extends from column to column, alsmoulded frame around a door & window.

Capital the crowning feature of a column or pilaster

Below are the Three Basic Orders of Greek columns.

a. Doric Order

The Doric order had a timber origin. Greek columns began as tapered tree trunks. The Doristyle was used in mainland Greece and spread from there to the Greek colonies in South Ital& Sicily. The Doric style was more formal and austere. Most of the best known survivingGreek buildings, such as the Parthenon and the Temple of Hephaestus in Athens, areDoric.

b. Ionic Order


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The Ionic style was used in the cities ofIonia (now the west coast ofTurkey) and some of the Aegean isla(Asia Minor). The Ionic style is more relaxed and decorative. The Erechtheum, next to the ParthenonIonic. The Ionic order became dominant in the Hellenistic period, since its more decorative style suited aesthetic of the period better than the more restrained Doric.

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Hartdes - Ancient Greece by Pm - Part 1