This volume's aim is to introduce the reader to the broad and multifaceted notion of context in relation to Greek art and, more specifically, to its relevance for the study of Greek sculpture and pottery from the Archaic to the Late Classical periods. What do we mean by 'context'? In which ways and under what circumstances does context become relevant for the interpretation of Greek material culture? Which contexts should we look at --viewing context, political, social and religious discourse, artistic tradition...? What happens when there is no context? This book introduces these questions in a series of case studies and offers answers to them.
Offering a unique blend of thematic and chronological investigation, this highly illustrated, engaging text explores the rich historical, cultural, and social contexts of 3,000 years of Greek art, from the Bronze Age through the Hellenistic period. Uniquely intersperses chapters devoted to major periods of Greek art from the Bronze Age through the Hellenistic period, with chapters containing discussions of important contextual themes across all of the periods Contextual chapters illustrate how a range of factors, such as the urban environment, gender, markets, and cross-cultural contact, influenced the development of art Chronological chapters survey the appearance and development of key artistic genres and explore how artifacts and architecture of the time reflect these styles Offers a variety of engaging and informative pedagogical features to help students navigate the subject, such as timelines, theme-based textboxes, key terms defined in margins, and further readings. Information is presented clearly and contextualized so that it is accessible to students regardless of their prior level of knowledge A book companion website is available at www.wiley.gom/go/greekart with the following resources: PowerPoint slides, glossary, and timeline
Greek Art and Aesthetics in the Fourth Century B.C. analyzes the broad character of art produced during this period, providing in-depth analysis of and commentary on many of its most notable examples of sculpture and painting. Taking into consideration developments in style and subject matter, and elucidating political, religious, and intellectual context, William A. P. Childs argues that Greek art in this era was a natural outgrowth of the high classical period and focused on developing the rudiments of individual expression that became the hallmark of the classical in the fifth century. As Childs shows, in many respects the art of this period corresponds with the philosophical inquiry by Plato and his contemporaries into the nature of art and speaks to the contemporaneous sense of insecurity and renewed religious devotion. Delving into formal and iconographic developments in sculpture and painting, Childs examines how the sensitive, expressive quality of these works seamlessly links the classical and Hellenistic periods, with no appreciable rupture in the continuous exploration of the human condition. Another overarching theme concerns the nature of “style as a concept of expression,” an issue that becomes more important given the increasingly multiple styles and functions of fourth-century Greek art. Childs also shows how the color and form of works suggested the unseen and revealed the profound character of individuals and the physical world.
Looking at Greek Art, by Mark D. Stansbury-O'Donnell, offers a practical guide to the methods for approaching, analyzing, and contextualizing an unfamiliar piece of Greek art. It demonstrates how objects are dated and assigned to an artist or region; how to interpret the subject matter and narrative; how to reconstruct the context for which an object was made, distributed, and used; and how we can explore broader cultural perspectives by looking at questions of identity, gender, and relationships to surrounding cultures. Each section focuses on different theoretical approaches, providing an overview of the theories, key terms, and required evidence. Case studies serve to demonstrate each process and some key issues to consider when using a given approach. This book explores a variety of media, including terracotta, metalwork, and jewelry, in addition to works found in major museum collections in the United States and Europe.
On museum visits, we pass by beautiful, well-preserved vases from ancient Greece—but how often do we understand what the images on them depict? In Image and Myth, Luca Giuliani tells the stories behind the pictures, exploring how artists of antiquity had to determine which motifs or historical and mythic events to use to tell an underlying story while also keeping in mind the tastes and expectations of paying clients. Covering the range of Greek style and its growth between the early Archaic and Hellenistic periods, Giuliani describes the intellectual, social, and artistic contexts in which the images were created. He reveals that developments in Greek vase painting were driven as much by the times as they were by tradition—the better-known the story, the less leeway the artists had in interpreting it. As literary culture transformed from an oral tradition, in which stories were always in flux, to the stability of written texts, the images produced by artists eventually became nothing more than illustrations of canonical works. At once a work of cultural and art history, Image and Myth builds a new way of understanding the visual culture of ancient Greece.
This handbook explores key aspects of art and architecture in ancient Greece and Rome. Drawing on the perspectives of scholars of various generations, nationalities, and backgrounds, it discusses Greek and Roman ideas about art and architecture, as expressed in both texts and images, along with the production of art and architecture in the Greek and Roman world.
The proem to Herodotus's history of the Greek-Persian wars relates the long-standing conflict between Europe and Asia from the points of view of the Greeks' chief antagonists, the Persians and Phoenicians. However humorous or fantastical these accounts may be, their stories, as voiced by a Greek, reveal a great deal about the perceived differences between Greeks and others. The conflict is framed in political, not absolute, terms correlative to historical events, not in terms of innate qualities of the participants. Becky Martin reconsiders works of art produced by, or thought to be produced by, Greeks and Phoenicians during the first millennium B.C., when they were in prolonged contact with one another. Although primordial narratives that emphasize an essential quality of Greek and Phoenician identities have been critiqued for decades, Martin contends that the study of ancient history has not yet effectively challenged the idea of the inevitability of the political and cultural triumph of Greece. She aims to show how the methods used to study ancient history shape perceptions of it and argues that art is especially positioned to revise conventional accountings of the history of Greek-Phoenician interaction. Examining Athenian and Tyrian coins, kouros statues and wall mosaics, as well as the familiar Alexander Sarcophagus and the sculpture known as the "Slipper Slapper, " Martin questions what constituted "Greek" and "Phoenician" art and, by extension, Greek and Phoenician identity.