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¶ … Eyes
Egyptian, Greek, and Roman Sculpture
Different cultures see the world in different ways. Religion, society, and even politics, shape our views, and give form to our human environment. Architecture, music, literature, dress -- all are visible manifestations of a people's values. This is no less true in the realm of sculpture. A religious people will create works of art that express its most deeply held spiritual beliefs; a cerebral people, sculptures that capture humankind's highest ideals, while the politically minded turn out statues and busts that represent their world's movers and shakers. Styles can range from the formal and the symbolic, to the ideal and the real. Each serves its cultural purpose. As all peoples have done, the Egyptians, the Greeks, and the Romans produced sculptures that testify to the beliefs of their respective societies.
Ancient Egypt was a fundamentally religious society. The axis of its world turned around the will of a god-king who endlessly re-enacted the drama of his father the sun's journey across the sky and through the underworld. Life after death was central to Egyptian belief, as was the necessity of preserving the body intact. A world so regulated and repetitive required an art that expressed order and stability. The canons of Egyptian society and its art are aptly displayed in the towering Colossi of Rameses at Abu Simbel. Here as in all depictions of the king, individual characteristics...
"The greatness of the Egyptian gods [is] represented by the images of the divine king and his family." (Schulz and Seidel p.214) In each of the four identical statues, the Pharaoh is represented as a majestic giant, his hands resting calmly by his sides as he sits motionless on his eternal throne. His enormous size is a reflection of his importance, his wife but a tiny doll-like figure at his feet. Fixed eyes, slightly muscular chest, clenched fists, and narrow waist: his form is the same as those of the pharaohs before him. Nor has the costume been varied, for he wears the same short royal skirt, beard, and crown of his ancestors of centuries before. (Shaw, p.299) It is the pose and the insignia of royalty that mark him as king. The mammoth figures are as one with the rock from which they were carved - the god-king is as much a part of the natural order of things as the cliff itself.
In contrast to the Egyptians and their almost timeless world, the Classical Greeks valued rational inquiry. Their sculptures reflected the highest ideals to which man should aspire. Hermes and the Child Dionysos by Praxiteles shows two gods as human beings in normal proportion. Rather than being symbolic representations of all-powerful, unchanging gods, they are images of two seeming real, if very perfect individuals. It is this perfection of the human form and its application to both gods and men that is the hallmark of Greek Classical art. For by this…
Bibliography
Duby, Georges and Daval, Jean-Luc, Eds. Sculpture from Antiquity to the Middle Ages. New York: Taschen, 1991.
Gowing, Sir Lawrence, et al., Eds. A History of Art. New York: Barnes & Noble Books, 1995.
Schulz, Regine and Seidel, Matthew, Eds. Egypt: The World of the Pharaohs. Cologne: Konemann, 1998.
Shaw, Ian Ed. The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000.
civilizations we have studied thus far in this course, which do you believe has contributed the most to our present society and why? You must state you case by giving specific examples based on reading and research. Each civilization of the world has grown and evolved on the contributions made by civilization preceding their own. It is beyond contesting that Mesopotamian and Egyptian civilizations (3000-12000 B.C.E.) laid the foundation of
Artists express feelings, thoughts, and images within their art. Sometimes they show more than that and paint their spirit on canvas. Spirituality was an important aspect of identity for many throughout the centuries and millennia. In modern times, artists like Georges Braque and Wassily Kandinsky wished to showcase the essence of the intangible by illustrating it through unique patterns and shapes. During the Renaissance period, and during the Baroque
"The Greeks studied the movement of the body, how weight is carried, and how a shift in stance could affect the placement of limbs, torso, and head. After 480 BCE, the first marble sculpture displaying the qualities of 'contrapposto," or weight shift, appeared in the Kritios Boy" ("Classical Greek Sculpture: Background," Greek Sculpture, 1998). This is why classical sculptures are more atomically naturalistic. This is particularly evident in the
The artworks prevalent during the early Middle Ages in many ways stand between these two extremes. The art of this period was one that was both religiously inclined but also celebrated the human form and human nature that was to become so prominent in the Renaissance. In many ways much of early Medieval art was similar to the abstract and decorative art that we find in Islamic examples. An example
art from three different cultures. Specifically it will discuss pieces from the Classical Greek, Indian Civilizations, and Egyptian Civilizations, including the meaning of the work and an art analysis of the work. Each of these different cultures produced very different works of art that were meant to entertain, enlighten, and be viewed for enjoyment. They used different techniques, but there were commonalities, as well. They represent some of the
In addition, a theorized creation period is given, as well as the current location of the statue. However, very little other detail is given for this important piece. Kortum, R. Warrior Vase. No date. East Tennessee State University. October 16, 2006 http://faculty.etsu.edu/kortumr/05mycenae/htmdescriptionpages/12vase.htm. The author, a professor at East Tennessee State, gives a brief description of the krater (mixing bowl) pottery from the 12th century BC and now housed in the National