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Classical Greek sculpture

Classical Greek sculpture has long been regarded as the highest point in the development of sculptural art in Ancient Greece, becoming almost synonymous with "Greek sculpture". The Canon, a treatise on the proportions of the human body written by Polykleitos around 450 B.C., is generally considered its starting point, and its end marked with the conquest of Greece by the Macedonians in 338 B.C., when Greek art began a great diffusion to the East, from where it received influences, changed its character, and became cosmopolitan. This phase is known as the Hellenistic period. In this period, the tradition of Greek Classicism was consolidated, with Man being the new measure of the universe.

The Doryphoros, by Polykleitos, paradigm of the classical male canon. Copy in the National Archaeological Museum of Naples

The sculpture of Classicism developed an aesthetic that combined idealistic values with a faithful representation of nature, while avoiding overly realistic characterization and the portrayal of emotional extremes, generally maintaining a formal atmosphere of balance and harmony. Even when the character is immersed in battle scenes, their expression shows to be hardly affected by the violence of the events.[1][2]

Classicism raised Man to an unprecedented level of dignity, at the same time as it entrusted him with the responsibility of creating his own destiny, offering a model of harmonious life, in a spirit of comprehensive education for an exemplary citizenship. These values, together with their traditional association of beauty with virtue, found in the sculpture of the Classical period with its idealized portrait of the human being, a particularly apt vehicle for expression, and an efficient instrument of civic, ethical and aesthetic education. With it, a new form of representation of the human body - influential to this day - began, being one of the cores of the birth of a new philosophical branch, Aesthetics, and the stylistic foundation of later revivalist movements of importance, such as the Renaissance and Neoclassicism. Thus, Classicism had an enormous impact on Western culture and became a reference for the study of Western art history. Apart from its historical value, Classicism's intrinsic artistic quality has had great impact, the vast majority of ancient and modern critics praising it vehemently, and the museums that preserve it being visited by millions of people every year. The sculpture of Greek Classicism, although sometimes the target of criticism that relates its ideological basis to racial prejudices, aesthetic dogmatism, and other particularities, still plays a positive and renovating role in contemporary art and society.[3][4][5]

Definition of "classic" edit

 
Leo von Klenze: Ideal Reconstruction of the Acropolis of Athens, 1846

The word "classical" has wide usage, and there is yet no consensus in specialized literature regarding its exact definition. The Greek and Roman civilizations have been called classical in their entirety for having established cultural standards that have become canonical and are valid today. The term is still used with a stricter meaning, to refer to a brief period within the long history of ancient Greek culture – from the mid-5th century to almost the end of the 4th century BC. – when a style that for many centuries would be considered the highest achievement in the art of sculpture developed, earning the designation of classic.[6][note 1]

Context and background edit

 
Athenian Tetradrachm, classical period
 
Kroisos Kouros, original. National Archaeological Museum, Athens. Example of the Archaic style

Classicism in Greek sculpture derives mainly from the Athenian cultural evolution in the 5th century B.C. In Athens, the main artistic figure was Phidias, but Classicism owes an equally important aesthetic contribution to Polykleitos, active in Argos. However, in those times Athens was a much more influential city, hence its greater role as a diffuser of the new trend. Around the middle of the 5th century B.C., Greece was experiencing a moment of glory; after the victory against the Persians, Athens had assumed the leadership of the Greek cities, heading the Delian League and being the custodian of its treasury.

Pericles dominated local politics between 460 and 429 B.C., aiming to turn the city into a model for the entire Greek world. He encouraged imperialism, reducing his former allies to the status of tributaries, but protected artists and philosophers, who gave shape and voice to his ideals. His role in the history of Greek sculpture stems from his decision to rebuild the city by breaking a vow made by the Athenians to leave in ruins the monuments that had been destroyed by the Persians, as a perennial reminder of barbarism. Using partly his own resources and partly the surpluses from the League's treasury, Pericles employed a multitude of laborers and craftsmen, which both energized the economy and left a monumental testimony to the city's new political and cultural status. The main legacy of the vast undertaking was the renovation of the Acropolis of Athens, with Phidias as the artistic director of the works.[7][8] Plutarch later described the enthusiasm that boiled over:

 
Olympia Master. Apollon of Olympia, original. Archaeological Museum of Olympia. Example of the Severe style

As the works went on, resplendent in grandeur and possessing inimitable grace of form, and as the craftsmen strove to surpass each other in the beauty of their work, it was wonderful how quickly the new structures were executed...There was an aspect of novelty in each work, and they seemed timeless. It is as if a life in continual bloom and a spirit of eternal youth had been infused into their creation.[9]

Philosophy shifted its focus from the natural world to human society, believing that Man could be the author of his own destiny. More than that, Man was now considered the center of Creation. Sophocles expresses this new thinking in Antigone (c. 442 BC), saying:

There are many wonders, but none so admirable as Man.

Across the stormy sea in the winter storms

this creature makes their way

through the gigantic waves.

And the earth, the most ancient of goddesses,

the one that is immortal and immune to old age, he works

plowing back and forth, year after year

turning the soil with the horses it has fed. (...)

"With his inventions he subdues the fierce beasts of the mountains,

the wild horse he muzzles and puts a halter on,

as he does with the indefatigable mountain bull.

He taught himself language, swift as the wind,

and learned for himself how to live in society,

how to escape from the impetus of the storms

and the piercing cold of the white days.

He can face anything, he is never unprepared,

whatever the future brings. Only from death he doesn't know how to escape,

for even for the most serious illnesses, he has found a cure.[10]

Thus, Classicism was born out of a sense of confidence in the abilities and achievements of a particular people, and a desire for glory and eternity for themselves. This pride can be seen in the political discourse and literature of the time, and poets and philosophers were already aware of the implications of this new way of seeing the world. Man became the new measure of the world, which was to be judged based on human experience. This is present, for example, in the mathematical irregularity of the Parthenon's dimensions, which deviate from strict orthogonality to achieve effects of purely optical regularity. It is also expressed in the rapid and growing naturalism of the sculptural representation of human forms.[11][12]

Regarding the elaboration of the typical classical form itself, its naturalism owes much to the achievements of sculptors of the period preceding the Classical. The previous fifty years had been a period of a rapid radical social and aesthetic change, which determined the abandonment of the Archaic pattern for another which was called Severe. The Archaic style made use of several conventions inherited from the Egyptians, and its most important genre, the male nude (the kouros) had a fixed formula: An image of stylized lines that retained from the real human body only the most basic features, that displayed an invariably smiling face and the same bodily attitude.

This model prevailed with little variation for more than two hundred years, but the artists of the Severe period introduced a new sense of naturalism to it, opening the way for the study of anatomy and for the expression of emotions in a more realistic and varied way. Around 455 B.C., Myron, a sculptor of the transition, created his Discobolus, a work that already shows a more advanced degree of naturalism, and soon after, around 450 B.C., Polykleitos consolidated a new canon of proportions, a synthesis that convincingly expressed the beauty, harmony and vitality of the body and gave it an aspect of eternity and perennial youth. Almost at the same time, in 446 B.C. Phidias, leading the group of sculptors decorating the Acropolis, left in the reliefs and statuary of the Parthenon the first series of classicist works on a monumental scale, establishing thematic and narrative models that would endure for a long time. With them, the foundations for the sculpture of what is called High Classicism (c. 450-420 B.C.) were laid.[13][14][8][1]

High Classicism edit

 
Bust of Artemis, with the typical classical figure of idealized features and impassive expression. Roman copy, National Archaeological Museum of Naples

Since the Severe period, the effort of artists was directed towards obtaining an increasing verisimilitude of sculptural forms concerning the living model but also seeking to transcend mere likeness to express their inner virtues. For the ancient Greeks, physical beauty was identified with moral perfection, in a concept known as kalokagathia. According to this, the education and cultivation of the body were as important as the improvement of the character, both being essential for the formation of a happy individual and an integrated citizen useful to society. In this philosophical panorama, which found expression in a highly organized educational model known as paideia, art had a privileged space as a creator of symbols with educational potential, being understood as a public utility activity. Since art had the function to educate rather than only please, the man it represented had to look good, virtuous, and beautiful, so that such qualities, visibly enshrined in countless statues, would permeate the collective consciousness and determine the adoption of a healthy, harmonious, and positive way of life, ultimately ensuring the happiness of all. The fusion of naturalism with idealism, typical of Classicism sculpture, a fusion so successful and influential that came to be called "classical" (in the sense of being the ultimate model), was, in short, a suitable channel for the artistic manifestation of the dominant ideology.[15][16][17]

An important contribution that crystallized the association between art and ethics was given in the Archaic period by Pythagoras, based on his research in the field of mathematics applied to music and psychology. Considering that the various musical genres impressed the soul in different ways and were able to induce psychological states and defined behaviors, according to him, if music did not imitate the mathematically expressed harmony of the cosmos, it could cause disturbances in people's souls and thus in society as a whole. This association was soon expanded to the other arts, attributing to them similar powers of individual and, consequently, collective transformation. His thought would have a profound influence on Plato's, who would take the aesthetic discussion even further, thoroughly exploring its moral and social repercussions.[18]

Polykleitos and Phidias edit

 
Polykleitos: Diadumenos, Roman copy. National Archaeological Museum of Athens

Polykleitos was, as far as is known, the first to systematize these values and concepts applied to sculpture in a theoretical work, the Canon. In it, the author showed a model of representation that was ideally beautiful and "real"; ideal as it avoided individual characterization by synthesizing all men into one, and real because it was very similar to the true human form, allowing immediate and personal identification by the audience. The work has been lost, but later commentaries on it demonstrate the idea of its content. Galen stated that according to the Canon, beauty:[19]

It does not lie in the symmetry of the elements of the body, but in the adequate proportion between the parts, as for instance, from one finger to another finger, from the fingers together to the hands and wrist, from these to the forearm, from thence to the arm, and from all to all, just as it is written in the Canon of Polykleitos. Having taught us in this treatise all the symmetries of the body, Polykleitos ratified the text with a work, having made a statue of a man according to the postulates of his treatise, and calling the statue, like the treatise, the Canon. Since then, all philosophers and doctors accept that beauty lies in the adequate proportion of the parts of the body.[19]

 
Phidia's Workshop: Fragment of the original north frieze of the Parthenon, now in the British Museum

The statue Galen speaks of is today identified as likely being the Doryphoros,[15] and Arnold Hauser has suggested, almost without objection, that it represents Achilles.[20] Andrew Stewart mentions that the author's intention with it was to polemicize, criticizing the style of predecessors like Pythagoras – not to be confused with the philosopher – who were more concerned with symmetry and rhythm. His neutral and dispassionate expression, his balance between staticity and movement (the contrapposto), his care in establishing a strict system of proportions that defined the whole composition of the body figure and the relations of the parts to each other, appeared as a great novelty in his time. It represented a perfect visible illustration of Sophrosyne, self-control, and moderation, one of the basic virtues that made up arete, and the Apollonian doctrine of "nothing in excess", which characterized the true hero. Although highly appreciated, Polykleitos' system, however, was not approved for all cases. Its unsuitability for narrative and violent contexts such as battle scenes was criticized, and writers such as Quintilian later said that this system failed to express the authority of the gods, which may reflect an older opinion. Even so, the success of the model is evidenced by the large number of times it was copied and its profound influence on later generations. Modern writers have also found analogies between Doryphoros' balance (based on a delicate balance of opposing forces) and Hippocrates' formulations of medicine, and therefore believe that the famous physician's thinking was deliberately assimilated by the sculptor.[21][22][23]

 
Attributed to Phidias: Hermes Ludovisi, Roman copy. National Roman Museum
 
Attributed to Polykleitos or Crésilas: Wounded Amazon, Roman copy signed by Sosicles. Capitoline Museums

Polykleitos may have been inspired by the earlier research on proportions by the sculptor Pythagoras. Still, his ideas were part of his contemporaries' quest to discover the regular and harmonious structure (the basic model) underlying the infinite variations of the same kind of thing in the physical world and to establish definite numerical relationships to replicate this regularity and harmony in art, continuing the philosopher Pythagoras' theory that the universe was structured by numbers. Two other of his compositions are now also called "canonical": The Discophoros and the Diadumenos, as they are variations of the basic model.[24]

As for Phidias, his work inherited the austerity of the Severe style by combining it with the achievements of Polykleitos, and was appreciated for the high idealism and ethos it expressed. As director of the decoration of the Parthenon, he supervised a group of several masters with diverse preparation and tendencies, which made the overall result heterogeneous, showing both Severe and other more advanced, naturalistic traits, and technical quality not always considered the ideal one. This ensemble is the most ambitious sculptural achievement of High Classicism.

Phidia's success among his contemporaries and his enduring memory derive mainly from his colossal cult statues of Athena and Zeus, which used to be installed respectively in the Parthenon in Athens and the temple of Zeus in Olympia. Both were covered with gold and ivory and had a huge impact at the time. Of the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, considered one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world, only literary descriptions and crude images engraved on coins of the time remain. But of the Athena Parthenos, created in 438 B.C., several reduced copies of poorer quality survived. Other works that persevered through copies and are attributed to him, without much assurance, are the Lemnian Athena, the Apollo of Cassel, a wounded Amazon, and a Hermes Ludovisi.[25][26][27]

Other sculptors working around Polykleitos' proposal in the period of High Classicism are Alcamenes, Kresilas, and Paeonius. Callimachus, a master greatly appreciated for the refinement of his works, is regarded as the inventor of the Corinthian capital, and Calamis, another relevant name, was Phidias' assistant and is credited with the design of the Parthenon metopes. However, his style still carried some influence from the Severe period, of which he was one of the greatest representatives.[obsolete source]

Arete x pathos in artistic mimesis edit

The impersonal, balanced, and austere style of Polykleitos and Phidias, which typifies High Classicism, did not last for long. In his Memorabilia, Xenophon left more information about the state of art criticism in the transition to Late Classicism. In the text, which recalls Socrates' career, it is shown that at this time there was a debate about the capabilities and limits of mimesis (imitation). He argues with Kleitos – an unknown sculptor whom some consider to be Polykleitos – saying that his statues of winning athletes should show not only an ideal of beauty but also what was happening in the psyche, the soul. The interpretation of this passage is controversial but it raises a question about the relationship between appearances and truth, and admits the possibility of art expressing pathos, individual emotion, and drama, in direct opposition to the neutrality and restraint of Polykleitos. For an audience used to seeing in celebratory statues, not a tribute to the individual who served as a model, but a portrait of collective heroism, an example to be followed by all citizens and a service rendered to the whole society, this concept came as a shock, weakening the absolute and invariable character of arete.[28][29] Regarding the problem of the imitative representation of nature in art, Stephen Halliwell says:

Even within the confines of the conversations reported by Xenophon in the Memorabilia, we can discern a tension – a tension that would become central to the entire legacy of mimesis – between divergent views on representational art being, on the one hand, a fictional illusion, the product of a 'deceptive' artifact, and, on the other, a reflection of and an engagement with reality.[30]

This paradox announced the end of the primacy of the ideal. The individual sphere of interest became increasingly important, which would be the essence of the art of the 4th century B.C., when Plato and Aristotle would extraordinarily deepen what Socrates had outlined, laying the foundations for the development of an entirely new philosophical branch: Aesthetics.[31]

Low Classicism edit

 
Bronze statue of Artemis, Greek original. Archaeological Museum of Piraeus
 
Bust of Socrates, Roman copy. National Archaeological Museum of Naples
 
Attributed to Euphranor: Paris, Roman copy. Louvre Museum

By the end of the 5th century B.C., Athens' hegemony was in decline, weakened by internal unrest and external wars, and soon Sparta, Corinth, and Thebes became prominent. However, at the beginning of the 4th century B.C., Athens regained some of its power and prestige, restored its democracy and its wealth grew again. Even so, politics became more and more complex, having developed what is called the "state apparatus," and the polis lost its communitarian character. At the same time, Greek colonies around the Mediterranean multiplied, some achieving great development, with diversified and profitable economies that imitated the social model of the metropolitan polis. The decentralization of culture throughout these regions and the rise of a wealthy merchant class, consumers of art but with its own values, opened the way for the appreciation of individual taste and the influence of foreign cultural elements, dissolving the rigidity and austerity of High Classicism.[32][33]

In sculpture, the concern with verisimilitude became even more pronounced. Innovations in the stone carving technique allowed greater control in the finishing of details, in the representation of robes and dresses, and in the polishing of surfaces to obtain subtle effects of light and shadow. The sculptors of the new generation introduced a general relaxation of Polykleitos' canon, developing a new repertoire of more dynamic attitudes of the body and setting aside the mathematically established proportions to create images convincing to the senses, more similar to real world bodies with their physical idiosyncrasies and personal affections. Thus began the period called Lower Classicism, or Late Classicism.

The statues acquire an even more emphatic "presence", also a result of new detailed and realistic treatment given to the face, hair and beard. The individualized portrait was born, an innovation attributed to Lysistratus, the first, according to Pliny the Elder, to make molds of the model's face. The goal was transferred from beautification to likeness, inviting the spectator to meditate on the possible discrepancies between the moral value and the external appearance. The realistic portraits of Socrates from this period, whose appearance was notorious as well as his virtue, exemplify the new dimension into which the art of bodily representation began to permeate.[34]

While the preferences of the expanding market were increasingly opening up to individual taste, Plato's traditionalist and idealistic questionings of the role of mimesis in art, plus his condemnation of the tragic, raised problems for the validation of the artistic product that have not yet been fully resolved.[35][36][37] The theoretical debate in the transition to Lower Classicism was advanced by Aristotle, whose theory of catharsis contributed to the formulation of a new concept of art liberally avoiding the condemnation of popular culture and its typical emotionalism. He also defended the representation of "nonbeautiful" objects based on the assumption that ugliness in art could be a source of teaching and aesthetic pleasure, overcoming the sorrow that its contemplation in real life would cause. Still, Aristotle did not stop advising young individuals to prefer works by artists he qualified as ethical, those whose creations best exemplified good human character, because their influence would be beneficial to the entire polis.

Such ideas contributed to the fact that sculpture production continued to flourish, meeting new needs, but the closer approach to the natural did not mean a complete abandonment of the ideal. Realism as a dominant trend would only appear in Greek sculpture with the succeeding Hellenistic school. Lysippos still criticized sculptors who created works from the natural and prided himself on modeling men as they "should" be.[38][39][40][41] In the field of sacred statuary, there were also new aspects. In the myths, all mortals who saw gods in their glory died, became blind, insane, or suffered in other ways. The culture of the time was able to accept partial and imperfect representations of the gods. Even shapeless stones, trees, and places could be recognized as receptacles for the divine, and anthropomorphic cult statues could remain hidden or semi-hidden by veils, robes, and various adornments, requiring the devotee to exercise spiritual contemplation that did not require likeness to take place, although it might be facilitated by an idol that looked beautiful or majestic, or that more directly evoked the attributes of the god.

However, thinkers like Plato considered the anthropomorphization of a deity to be unbecoming and misleading, as it not only misrepresented its object but also demeaned it in an attempt to bring it too much into the sphere of the human. To face these difficulties, later sculptors made use of special resources to keep the distance between gods and men clear, rescuing archaic stylistic traits such as frontality, hieratic posture, impassive and supernatural features, which, in contrast to the increasingly naturalistic and expressive style of profane statuary, delimited well the spheres of the sacred and the mundane and forced the devotee to respect the idol, as a reminder that the divine remains forever essentially unknowable. When the representation of the deities was not directly linked to the cult, as in monuments and decorative architectural reliefs, there was greater formal freedom, although some of the same conventions were observed and an attempt was made to maintain traits that well identified the divine aspect of the character.[42][43][44]

 
Praxiteles: Aphrodite Braschi, version of the Aphrodite of Knidos, Roman copy. Munich Glyptothek

The emphasis on naturalism in statues also gave rise to consequences in the affective realm. It was not unusual that in their function as stand-ins for a person or a god, statues were the object of intense love, which could lead to the desire to get emotional and/or sexual gratification from the statues. From Pandora to Pygmalion, myths relate various intimate interactions of statues with humans, and historical records show that mortals could also fall into the temptation to seek from the simulacra. Aristophanes warned against the risk of humans giving in to passions in front of statues or becoming too attached to them, and being condemned to live as the living dead nurturing an ever-incomplete love, although he considered that from the inevitable frustration could be born the opportunity for the individual to discover themselves.[45]

Praxiteles, Scopas and Lysippos edit

Greek sculpture of the 4th century B.C. was dominated by three great figures: Praxiteles, Scopas and Lysippos. Praxiteles is likely to have been the first to fully explore the sensual possibilities of marble. The erotic appeal of his Aphrodite of Knidos – the first completely nude female statue in Greek art – made her famous in her day and gave rise to the prolific typological family of the Venus Pudica. His Hermes and the Infant Dionysus illustrates his mastery in depicting the facial expression and grace of flexible, sinuous bodies.

Scopas became known for the sense of drama, violence, dynamism, and passion with which he imbued his works, especially those he left in the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus, the most important Greek architectural achievement in this period, although in others he showed his ability to portray tranquility and harmony. Lysippos reformulated the Polykleitos canon by reducing the dimensions of the head and making the figure more elongated, though more massive. He is also credited with the first statue whose finish was carried out equally in all directions, the Apoxiomenon, enabling the viewer to appreciate it not only from a single, privileged point of view, as was still the use of Polykleitos.

 
Attributed to Scopas: Ludovisi Ares, Roman copy. National Roman Museum

These masters, along with other notable figures of their generation such as Leochares, Bryaxis, Cephisodotus the Elder, Euphranor, and Timotheus, resolved all outstanding basic difficulties regarding form and technique that might still hinder the free expression of the idea in matter. Thus, they contributed with great achievements in the process of exploring human anatomy, the representation of clothing, and solving problems of composition, being the link in the passage from the classical to the Hellenistic tradition, as well as bringing the technique of stone carving and bronze modeling to an unprecedented level of quality. The following generations would have little to add to the essence of classical art, but would deepen their research into the portrayal of the emotional and the prosaic, bringing marble sculpture to a level of true technical virtuosity.[32][46][47]

The study of the functions and meanings of classical sculpture is still progressing. The reciprocal interactions and influences at various levels that categories, uses, and attributions might have established are not fully known, and much remains to be elucidated about how representation influenced the construction of concepts and practices regarding gender, status, social inclusion, affect, sexuality, aesthetics, ideology, politics, religion, ethics, and the historical evolution of Greek society. Part of such difficulty is due to the fact that many works are only known through literary references, later copies, are in an incomplete and damaged state, or because their dating and attribution of authorship are often uncertain and the biographies of their creators have multiple gaps and inconsistencies.[48]

Other uses and techniques edit

In the purely technical field, there were no radical advances in what the sculptors of the Archaic and Severe period had already achieved. The Archaic marbles already showed a very high mastery of stone, visible especially in their architectural reliefs. In the case of bronze, the main innovation in their history for Greek sculpture was the development of the lost wax technique but its principles were already masterfully handled in the Severe period, with a diversified application. Therefore, Classicism benefited from the fact that the main sculptural techniques had already been refined enough that the main interest shifted to the aspects of form and meaning, although always with some advances in refinement.[49]

Funeral sculpture edit

 
Unknown author: Funerary stele of Thrasea and Euandria, original. Pergamon Museum

Among the uses of sculpture, was the composition of funeral monuments, where in general terms it shared the characteristics of decorative sculpture in temples and public buildings. The tradition of building monuments to the dead existed since the Archaic period when the kouros fulfilled this function. With the advent of democracy in the early 5th century B.C., customs began to change and funerary stelae – relief plaques with inscriptions – appeared.

After an irregular development, as they disappeared in some periods, in the Classic period they became a common practice in Attica, while in other regions they would only become popular in Hellenism. One of the first important stelae of Classicism is the Stela of Eufero, dated c. 430 B.C., its style showing a connection with the decorative sculpture of the Parthenon that was being created at the same time. It has been a traditional thought that such monuments were the endowment of the wealthy, but recent studies have indicated that their cost would have been much less than once thought, which means the lower classes could commission a votive plaque, although there were clear differences in luxury and sophistication between the burials of the common people and those of the great families. The museums of classical archeology exhibit a great number of specimens. Highlights are those of Late Classicism, which show portraits of the deceased together with family members in scenes sometimes of great sensitivity and poetry.[50][51]

Terracottas edit

Terracotta is an ancient technique; however, its application has been more common in pottery, with sculptural uses limited to decorative objects and small statuettes for popular usage, figuring actors, animals, and types of people. These had generally no great technical refinement and repeated crudely the formal principles of large sculpture. Larger and more refined pieces were rare, and would appear more often with the Hellenistic schools from the late 4th century B.C. onward. A rich artwork from Attica in the Louvre Museum is worth mentioning, suggesting advanced practices in this field already during Classicism.

Elements of terracotta in architectural decoration had great use in earlier and later periods but in Classicism rarely occurred. One type of terracotta that stands out is the statuettes with articulated limbs. This group has likely performed specific functions. They have been found in many tombs, suggesting an association with Cthonic deities. It is also speculated that they served as statues for domestic worship, as offerings to the gods, and as magical protection against evil forces. Many of them have holes in the back of their heads, indicating that they could be worn suspended, which allowed free movement of their limbs. It has been thought that they were children's dolls, but their fragility, preventing repeated handling, does not support this assumption. As for votive statues, a great syncretism of styles is observed, especially in Late Classicism, when archaic traits continue to appear in quantity, side by side with more progressive stylistic elements, following the conventions of monumental cult statuary.[52][53][54][55]

Goldsmithery edit

Goldsmithery was present as a technique of miniaturized sculpture, where there was significant production mainly in the colonies of Magna Grecia, Cyprus, and the southern Black Sea, with finds in mainland Greece being rare. Most of the jewelry of this phase is related to religious contexts, decorating cult statues, being votive offerings, or celebratory, as in the case of the gold crowns used in the apotheosis of politicians. The use of personal jewelry was not uncommon. Their quality, while high, is shown to be lower than the jewelry of the Archaic period. The motifs represented are in general abstract, animal, and vegetal, and the popularization of human forms happens at the end of the Classical period, along with the appearance of the first cameos.[56]

Copies and Color edit

 
Classic torso copy with attempted reconstitution of the original polychrome. Bunte Götter Exhibition

The common practice of the ancient Greeks was to cover their statues and architectural reliefs with paint, either partially or in its entirety, seeking an even more striking resemblance than their simple form and structure could achieve. For centuries, it was thought that their works appeared to them as they do nowadays, but in reality, they were richly colored. Studies suggest that in Classicism the use of color in sculpture was more discreet than in earlier periods. Recently researchers have tried to reconstruct the polychromy of statues in specially made copies, causing fascination and surprise as the usage of color differs from the one common today.[57][58][59][49]

 
Reduced bronze copy of the Diadumenos by Polykleitos. BnF Museum

Of great value for reconstructing the landscape of Greek sculpture are the miniature copies, which were extremely popular and replicated in smaller scale virtually every formal model and every important work of monumental statuary, a practice that was not limited to the Classical period. Still, some very successful subjects that were copied several times in their original size are not found in miniatures, as is the case of Polykleitos' Doryphoros. It is likely that the absence of finds is due to the fact that these were loaded with such strong significance, that their reduction would have seemed inappropriate.

The materials used for miniaturization were bronze, marble, ivory, and eventually other stones. Terracotta, despite its versatility, does not seem to have been considered a worthy material for the reproduction of celebrated works, at least not during Classicism.[60]

Legacy and Perspectives edit

Classical art has exerted a vast influence throughout the history of the West, as shown by the consensus among specialists. The sculptural legacy of the classics continues to interest multitudes even today. The very name – "classic" – indicates the unparalleled prestige they have acquired, for in current parlance "classic" is that which establishes a measure by which other things of that kind are judged.[61]

Classical sculpture was in its origin one of the levers for the birth of Aesthetics as an autonomous branch of Philosophy. Throughout history, its formal models were used for the most varied purposes, some of high humanistic inspiration, but sometimes in opposition to that, celebrating totalitarian regimes and personalisms of various kinds, as it happened during Nazism and Fascism.

In modern appreciation, the ideology underlying the sculpture of Greek Classicism does not remain free of criticism, being said to glorify a way of life and a people to detriment of others, and the collective to detriment of the individual, suppressing the questioning of the instituted order under the appearance of homogeneity and consensus. The execution of Socrates, accused of impiety and corruption of youth, by the same society that cultivated Classicism, shows how perversion and misinterpretation can happen with the positive purposes of improvement and education of the collectivity for fuller citizenship, a purer and more harmonious life, and more advanced ethics (principles that classical sculpture illustrated well). On the other hand, the criticism points to facets of a complex and contradictory social reality that were deliberately swept away from view in the art of that period.[62][63][64][65][66][67][68][69][47]

 
Chalimachus: Memade, Roman copy. Prado Museum

Classicism began its spread around the world through the Greek colonies scattered all around the Mediterranean and the Black Sea. Alexander the Great took it further, reaching India. In these regions, the principles of Greek sculpture were presented to the local populations and, blending with their traditions, gave rise to stylistic interpretations that more or less successfully reproduced the metropolitan aesthetic. This eclectic and cosmopolitan synthesis was called Hellenism.[70] Ancient Rome, in turn, was another avid recipient of classical Greek culture. Its sculptors took pride in working under Greek inspiration, and by multiplying copies of Greek originals that were later lost, they were the transmitters to posterity of a significant part of the culture they imitated.[71]

From the legacy transmitted by the Romans, early Christianity drew the models for starting its own art, but after the sixth century its policy changed. Until this time, immense amounts of sculpture had survived in temples and ancient monuments, but from then on, their ubiquitous nudity began to be seen as an offense to Christian morality, as well as being condemned as diabolical cult images and bad reminders of paganism. Losing their former value, ancient works began to be destroyed. On the other hand, during the Renaissance, classical culture fell back into the elites' favor and was the core of a recovery of the dignity of the body and of purely aesthetic pleasure. Christianity itself, after proscribing for centuries the pagan sculptural heritage, recovered it, transforming and adapting it to serve it and praise the heroes of the new order: the saints and martyrs of the faith. The Renaissance conception of art largely reproduces the idea formulated by the classical philosophers.[64][63] The prestige that classical statuary knew in this period reached the borders of passion, as can be seen in this excerpt by Giovanni Pietro Bellori:

 
Leochares: Apollo Belvedere, Roman copy. Vatican Museums

Painters and sculptors, choosing from among the most elegant beauties of the natural world, perfect the idea, and their works surpass and stand above Nature – which is the ultimate scope of these arts. [...] This is the origin of the veneration and awe we have for statues and paintings, and from this derives the reward and honor of Artists; this was the glory of Timantes, Apeles, Phidias and Lysippus, and of so many others renowned for their fame, all who, rising above human forms, achieved with their ideas and works an admirable perfection. This Idea may then be called the perfection of Nature, the miracle of art, the clairvoyance of the intellect, the example of the mind, the light of imagination, the rising sun, which from the east inspires the statue of Menon, and inflames the monument of Prometheus.[72]

For the Romantics, especially in Germany, Greece continued to be seen as a model of life and culture. Nietzsche exclaimed, "Oh, the Greeks! They knew how to live!". Other scholars, likewise, despising the Roman filter, began to cultivate the ideals of Greek Classicism to such an extent that a veritable Grecomania was created, influencing all humanities and artistic forms.[73][74] In Neoclassicism, classical humanism was a significant impulse for the consolidation of democratic and republican concepts. According to Winckelmann, one of the mentors of the movement, only the Greeks had managed to produce Beauty, and for him and his colleagues, the Apollo Belvedere was the most perfect achievement of sculpture of all time. Winckelmann is also credited with the distinction between High and Low Classicism, labeling the former as "grand and austere," and the latter as "beautiful and flowing." Meanwhile, Classicism crossed the Atlantic and inspired the formation of the North American state and its school of sculpture.[75][76][77][78]

In the early twentieth century, academic studies multiplied and were refined to unprecedented levels with the development of new methods of archaeological research and the improvement of the theoretical and instrumental apparatus.[79] At the same time, in a way officializing the intense love for the classics that since the 18th century had been cultivated by German intellectuals, Classicism was co-opted by the Nazis, who saw in its formal models the glorified image of the Aryan race. They saw in its values the basis for the formation of a pure society, a healthy race and a strong state, establishing it as a reference standard for state-sponsored art and using it to justify the eradication of races and cultures deemed "degenerate", such as the Jews and modernist art.[80][81] Mussolini tried to propose a similar model for Fascist Italy, but it did not have much practical impact.[74]

The classical educational model began to lose vigor under the impact of the Modernist revolution, and the ability of classical sculpture to inspire new artists rushed into a fulminant decline, although it never disappeared at all. This recovery was greatly encouraged by the post-modernists, for whom there was no point in destroying tradition, as Modernism had proposed since this was tantamount to a loss of memory and past, tantamount to the creation of a useless void. Thus, it would be better to appropriate and update it through conscious criticism, appearing in the form of quotations, allegories, re-readings, and paraphrases, which offer a retrospective view and commentary on the old tradition.[74]

 
Praxiteles: Hermes and the Infant Dionysus, possibly original. Archaeological Museum of Olympia

Today the formal patterns of classical Greek sculpture, its humanism and emphasis on the nude have found a new way to impress society, influencing the conception of beauty and practices regarding the body, resurrecting a cultivation of the physical that was born with the Greeks and influences various customs related to sexuality and the concept of body in media culture.

At the same time, a tendency is beginning to strengthen among art critics in the direction of abating the practically unanimous prestige that Modernism achieved and maintained for almost a century, with its individualistic, hermetic, irrational, abstracting, anti-historical and informal values beginning to be questioned. In this sense, the classical model may have a new attraction for artists and society in a context of updating the paideia, rescuing a line of work inspired by classical humanism, focused on the common good and the ethical and integral education of the public to which their works are directed, in a historical moment in which the emphasis on technology, along with consumerism, the excessive specialization of trades, wild urban life, ecological problems, the superficiality of mass culture, and the loss of strong moral references, have become threatening aspects for the well-being and the very survival of the human race.

Cultural tourism to museums and archaeological sites has been seen as a positive force for the dissemination of classical culture and art to the general public, although it may suffer from political manipulation and mercantilist degradation, possibly giving strength to simplistic, pasteurized, and uncritical views of the past.[82][83][84][85][86][87][88][89][90]

In any case, the presence of classical sculpture is still striking in Western culture, and with the wide Western penetration throughout the world, it has become known and appreciated globally. At least as far as the West is concerned, the appeal that the classical model has held throughout its history and still holds today attests to its persistent ability to stimulate the popular imagination and to be incorporated into a variety of cultural, ethical, social, and political ideologies.[63][91]

The classical heritage in the history of sculpture edit

See also edit

References edit

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  5. ^ GARDNER, Percy. "The Lamps of Greek Art". In LIVINGSTONE, R. W. The Legacy of Greece. Kessinger Publishing. pp. 353
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  7. ^ POLLITT, Jerome. Art and experience in classical Greece. Cambridge University Press, 1972. pp. 64–66
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  12. ^ POLLITT, p. 74
  13. ^ The period has a different chronology depending on the author consulted. The Encyclopedia Britannica extends it to c. 400 BC.
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Notes edit

  1. ^ However, as happens in all processes of artistic evolution, any dates that are rigorously defined usually prove to be inaccurate and subject to dispute, there always being elements of transition before and after the period in question, making the spectrum diffuse and difficult to characterize, thus adopting delimitations established by tradition.

External links edit

  • Greek Art. Encyclopedia of Irish and World Art
  • Western Sculpture: Ancient Greek: The Classical period. Encyclopaedia Britannica On line
  • Greek Art and Architecture. Encyclopedia Encarta 28 October 2009 at the Wayback Machine

classical, greek, sculpture, main, article, ancient, greek, sculpture, long, been, regarded, highest, point, development, sculptural, ancient, greece, becoming, almost, synonymous, with, greek, sculpture, canon, treatise, proportions, human, body, written, pol. Main article Ancient Greek sculpture Classical Greek sculpture has long been regarded as the highest point in the development of sculptural art in Ancient Greece becoming almost synonymous with Greek sculpture The Canon a treatise on the proportions of the human body written by Polykleitos around 450 B C is generally considered its starting point and its end marked with the conquest of Greece by the Macedonians in 338 B C when Greek art began a great diffusion to the East from where it received influences changed its character and became cosmopolitan This phase is known as the Hellenistic period In this period the tradition of Greek Classicism was consolidated with Man being the new measure of the universe The Doryphoros by Polykleitos paradigm of the classical male canon Copy in the National Archaeological Museum of Naples The sculpture of Classicism developed an aesthetic that combined idealistic values with a faithful representation of nature while avoiding overly realistic characterization and the portrayal of emotional extremes generally maintaining a formal atmosphere of balance and harmony Even when the character is immersed in battle scenes their expression shows to be hardly affected by the violence of the events 1 2 Classicism raised Man to an unprecedented level of dignity at the same time as it entrusted him with the responsibility of creating his own destiny offering a model of harmonious life in a spirit of comprehensive education for an exemplary citizenship These values together with their traditional association of beauty with virtue found in the sculpture of the Classical period with its idealized portrait of the human being a particularly apt vehicle for expression and an efficient instrument of civic ethical and aesthetic education With it a new form of representation of the human body influential to this day began being one of the cores of the birth of a new philosophical branch Aesthetics and the stylistic foundation of later revivalist movements of importance such as the Renaissance and Neoclassicism Thus Classicism had an enormous impact on Western culture and became a reference for the study of Western art history Apart from its historical value Classicism s intrinsic artistic quality has had great impact the vast majority of ancient and modern critics praising it vehemently and the museums that preserve it being visited by millions of people every year The sculpture of Greek Classicism although sometimes the target of criticism that relates its ideological basis to racial prejudices aesthetic dogmatism and other particularities still plays a positive and renovating role in contemporary art and society 3 4 5 Contents 1 Definition of classic 2 Context and background 3 High Classicism 3 1 Polykleitos and Phidias 3 2 Arete x pathos in artistic mimesis 4 Low Classicism 4 1 Praxiteles Scopas and Lysippos 5 Other uses and techniques 5 1 Funeral sculpture 5 2 Terracottas 5 3 Goldsmithery 5 4 Copies and Color 6 Legacy and Perspectives 6 1 The classical heritage in the history of sculpture 7 See also 8 References 9 Notes 10 External linksDefinition of classic edit nbsp Leo von Klenze Ideal Reconstruction of the Acropolis of Athens 1846 The word classical has wide usage and there is yet no consensus in specialized literature regarding its exact definition The Greek and Roman civilizations have been called classical in their entirety for having established cultural standards that have become canonical and are valid today The term is still used with a stricter meaning to refer to a brief period within the long history of ancient Greek culture from the mid 5th century to almost the end of the 4th century BC when a style that for many centuries would be considered the highest achievement in the art of sculpture developed earning the designation of classic 6 note 1 Context and background editSee also Severe style Classicism and Ancient Greece nbsp Athenian Tetradrachm classical period nbsp Kroisos Kouros original National Archaeological Museum Athens Example of the Archaic style Classicism in Greek sculpture derives mainly from the Athenian cultural evolution in the 5th century B C In Athens the main artistic figure was Phidias but Classicism owes an equally important aesthetic contribution to Polykleitos active in Argos However in those times Athens was a much more influential city hence its greater role as a diffuser of the new trend Around the middle of the 5th century B C Greece was experiencing a moment of glory after the victory against the Persians Athens had assumed the leadership of the Greek cities heading the Delian League and being the custodian of its treasury Pericles dominated local politics between 460 and 429 B C aiming to turn the city into a model for the entire Greek world He encouraged imperialism reducing his former allies to the status of tributaries but protected artists and philosophers who gave shape and voice to his ideals His role in the history of Greek sculpture stems from his decision to rebuild the city by breaking a vow made by the Athenians to leave in ruins the monuments that had been destroyed by the Persians as a perennial reminder of barbarism Using partly his own resources and partly the surpluses from the League s treasury Pericles employed a multitude of laborers and craftsmen which both energized the economy and left a monumental testimony to the city s new political and cultural status The main legacy of the vast undertaking was the renovation of the Acropolis of Athens with Phidias as the artistic director of the works 7 8 Plutarch later described the enthusiasm that boiled over nbsp Olympia Master Apollon of Olympia original Archaeological Museum of Olympia Example of the Severe style As the works went on resplendent in grandeur and possessing inimitable grace of form and as the craftsmen strove to surpass each other in the beauty of their work it was wonderful how quickly the new structures were executed There was an aspect of novelty in each work and they seemed timeless It is as if a life in continual bloom and a spirit of eternal youth had been infused into their creation 9 Philosophy shifted its focus from the natural world to human society believing that Man could be the author of his own destiny More than that Man was now considered the center of Creation Sophocles expresses this new thinking in Antigone c 442 BC saying There are many wonders but none so admirable as Man Across the stormy sea in the winter stormsthis creature makes their waythrough the gigantic waves And the earth the most ancient of goddesses the one that is immortal and immune to old age he worksplowing back and forth year after yearturning the soil with the horses it has fed With his inventions he subdues the fierce beasts of the mountains the wild horse he muzzles and puts a halter on as he does with the indefatigable mountain bull He taught himself language swift as the wind and learned for himself how to live in society how to escape from the impetus of the stormsand the piercing cold of the white days He can face anything he is never unprepared whatever the future brings Only from death he doesn t know how to escape for even for the most serious illnesses he has found a cure 10 Thus Classicism was born out of a sense of confidence in the abilities and achievements of a particular people and a desire for glory and eternity for themselves This pride can be seen in the political discourse and literature of the time and poets and philosophers were already aware of the implications of this new way of seeing the world Man became the new measure of the world which was to be judged based on human experience This is present for example in the mathematical irregularity of the Parthenon s dimensions which deviate from strict orthogonality to achieve effects of purely optical regularity It is also expressed in the rapid and growing naturalism of the sculptural representation of human forms 11 12 Regarding the elaboration of the typical classical form itself its naturalism owes much to the achievements of sculptors of the period preceding the Classical The previous fifty years had been a period of a rapid radical social and aesthetic change which determined the abandonment of the Archaic pattern for another which was called Severe The Archaic style made use of several conventions inherited from the Egyptians and its most important genre the male nude the kouros had a fixed formula An image of stylized lines that retained from the real human body only the most basic features that displayed an invariably smiling face and the same bodily attitude This model prevailed with little variation for more than two hundred years but the artists of the Severe period introduced a new sense of naturalism to it opening the way for the study of anatomy and for the expression of emotions in a more realistic and varied way Around 455 B C Myron a sculptor of the transition created his Discobolus a work that already shows a more advanced degree of naturalism and soon after around 450 B C Polykleitos consolidated a new canon of proportions a synthesis that convincingly expressed the beauty harmony and vitality of the body and gave it an aspect of eternity and perennial youth Almost at the same time in 446 B C Phidias leading the group of sculptors decorating the Acropolis left in the reliefs and statuary of the Parthenon the first series of classicist works on a monumental scale establishing thematic and narrative models that would endure for a long time With them the foundations for the sculpture of what is called High Classicism c 450 420 B C were laid 13 14 8 1 High Classicism edit nbsp Bust of Artemis with the typical classical figure of idealized features and impassive expression Roman copy National Archaeological Museum of Naples Since the Severe period the effort of artists was directed towards obtaining an increasing verisimilitude of sculptural forms concerning the living model but also seeking to transcend mere likeness to express their inner virtues For the ancient Greeks physical beauty was identified with moral perfection in a concept known as kalokagathia According to this the education and cultivation of the body were as important as the improvement of the character both being essential for the formation of a happy individual and an integrated citizen useful to society In this philosophical panorama which found expression in a highly organized educational model known as paideia art had a privileged space as a creator of symbols with educational potential being understood as a public utility activity Since art had the function to educate rather than only please the man it represented had to look good virtuous and beautiful so that such qualities visibly enshrined in countless statues would permeate the collective consciousness and determine the adoption of a healthy harmonious and positive way of life ultimately ensuring the happiness of all The fusion of naturalism with idealism typical of Classicism sculpture a fusion so successful and influential that came to be called classical in the sense of being the ultimate model was in short a suitable channel for the artistic manifestation of the dominant ideology 15 16 17 An important contribution that crystallized the association between art and ethics was given in the Archaic period by Pythagoras based on his research in the field of mathematics applied to music and psychology Considering that the various musical genres impressed the soul in different ways and were able to induce psychological states and defined behaviors according to him if music did not imitate the mathematically expressed harmony of the cosmos it could cause disturbances in people s souls and thus in society as a whole This association was soon expanded to the other arts attributing to them similar powers of individual and consequently collective transformation His thought would have a profound influence on Plato s who would take the aesthetic discussion even further thoroughly exploring its moral and social repercussions 18 Polykleitos and Phidias edit See also Polykleitos and Phidias nbsp Polykleitos Diadumenos Roman copy National Archaeological Museum of AthensPolykleitos was as far as is known the first to systematize these values and concepts applied to sculpture in a theoretical work the Canon In it the author showed a model of representation that was ideally beautiful and real ideal as it avoided individual characterization by synthesizing all men into one and real because it was very similar to the true human form allowing immediate and personal identification by the audience The work has been lost but later commentaries on it demonstrate the idea of its content Galen stated that according to the Canon beauty 19 It does not lie in the symmetry of the elements of the body but in the adequate proportion between the parts as for instance from one finger to another finger from the fingers together to the hands and wrist from these to the forearm from thence to the arm and from all to all just as it is written in the Canon of Polykleitos Having taught us in this treatise all the symmetries of the body Polykleitos ratified the text with a work having made a statue of a man according to the postulates of his treatise and calling the statue like the treatise the Canon Since then all philosophers and doctors accept that beauty lies in the adequate proportion of the parts of the body 19 nbsp Phidia s Workshop Fragment of the original north frieze of the Parthenon now in the British Museum The statue Galen speaks of is today identified as likely being the Doryphoros 15 and Arnold Hauser has suggested almost without objection that it represents Achilles 20 Andrew Stewart mentions that the author s intention with it was to polemicize criticizing the style of predecessors like Pythagoras not to be confused with the philosopher who were more concerned with symmetry and rhythm His neutral and dispassionate expression his balance between staticity and movement the contrapposto his care in establishing a strict system of proportions that defined the whole composition of the body figure and the relations of the parts to each other appeared as a great novelty in his time It represented a perfect visible illustration of Sophrosyne self control and moderation one of the basic virtues that made up arete and the Apollonian doctrine of nothing in excess which characterized the true hero Although highly appreciated Polykleitos system however was not approved for all cases Its unsuitability for narrative and violent contexts such as battle scenes was criticized and writers such as Quintilian later said that this system failed to express the authority of the gods which may reflect an older opinion Even so the success of the model is evidenced by the large number of times it was copied and its profound influence on later generations Modern writers have also found analogies between Doryphoros balance based on a delicate balance of opposing forces and Hippocrates formulations of medicine and therefore believe that the famous physician s thinking was deliberately assimilated by the sculptor 21 22 23 nbsp Attributed to Phidias Hermes Ludovisi Roman copy National Roman Museum nbsp Attributed to Polykleitos or Cresilas Wounded Amazon Roman copy signed by Sosicles Capitoline Museums Polykleitos may have been inspired by the earlier research on proportions by the sculptor Pythagoras Still his ideas were part of his contemporaries quest to discover the regular and harmonious structure the basic model underlying the infinite variations of the same kind of thing in the physical world and to establish definite numerical relationships to replicate this regularity and harmony in art continuing the philosopher Pythagoras theory that the universe was structured by numbers Two other of his compositions are now also called canonical The Discophoros and the Diadumenos as they are variations of the basic model 24 As for Phidias his work inherited the austerity of the Severe style by combining it with the achievements of Polykleitos and was appreciated for the high idealism and ethos it expressed As director of the decoration of the Parthenon he supervised a group of several masters with diverse preparation and tendencies which made the overall result heterogeneous showing both Severe and other more advanced naturalistic traits and technical quality not always considered the ideal one This ensemble is the most ambitious sculptural achievement of High Classicism Phidia s success among his contemporaries and his enduring memory derive mainly from his colossal cult statues of Athena and Zeus which used to be installed respectively in the Parthenon in Athens and the temple of Zeus in Olympia Both were covered with gold and ivory and had a huge impact at the time Of the Statue of Zeus at Olympia considered one of the Seven Wonders of the ancient world only literary descriptions and crude images engraved on coins of the time remain But of the Athena Parthenos created in 438 B C several reduced copies of poorer quality survived Other works that persevered through copies and are attributed to him without much assurance are the Lemnian Athena the Apollo of Cassel a wounded Amazon and a Hermes Ludovisi 25 26 27 Other sculptors working around Polykleitos proposal in the period of High Classicism are Alcamenes Kresilas and Paeonius Callimachus a master greatly appreciated for the refinement of his works is regarded as the inventor of the Corinthian capital and Calamis another relevant name was Phidias assistant and is credited with the design of the Parthenon metopes However his style still carried some influence from the Severe period of which he was one of the greatest representatives obsolete source Arete x pathos in artistic mimesis edit See also Mimesis and AestheticsThe impersonal balanced and austere style of Polykleitos and Phidias which typifies High Classicism did not last for long In his Memorabilia Xenophon left more information about the state of art criticism in the transition to Late Classicism In the text which recalls Socrates career it is shown that at this time there was a debate about the capabilities and limits of mimesis imitation He argues with Kleitos an unknown sculptor whom some consider to be Polykleitos saying that his statues of winning athletes should show not only an ideal of beauty but also what was happening in the psyche the soul The interpretation of this passage is controversial but it raises a question about the relationship between appearances and truth and admits the possibility of art expressing pathos individual emotion and drama in direct opposition to the neutrality and restraint of Polykleitos For an audience used to seeing in celebratory statues not a tribute to the individual who served as a model but a portrait of collective heroism an example to be followed by all citizens and a service rendered to the whole society this concept came as a shock weakening the absolute and invariable character of arete 28 29 Regarding the problem of the imitative representation of nature in art Stephen Halliwell says Even within the confines of the conversations reported by Xenophon in the Memorabilia we can discern a tension a tension that would become central to the entire legacy of mimesis between divergent views on representational art being on the one hand a fictional illusion the product of a deceptive artifact and on the other a reflection of and an engagement with reality 30 This paradox announced the end of the primacy of the ideal The individual sphere of interest became increasingly important which would be the essence of the art of the 4th century B C when Plato and Aristotle would extraordinarily deepen what Socrates had outlined laying the foundations for the development of an entirely new philosophical branch Aesthetics 31 nbsp Myron Discobolus Roman copy National Roman Museum nbsp Callimachus Venus Roman copy Louvre nbsp Phidias Workshop Dionysus original Formerly on the pediment of the Parthenon now in the British Museum nbsp Varvakeion Athena reduced copy of Phidias Athena Partheno originally in the Parthenon National Archaeological Museum of Athens nbsp Possibly designed by Calamis Southern metope of the Parthenon original British Museum nbsp Attributed to Kresilas Diomedes Roman copy Munich Glyptotheque nbsp Monument to the Nereids original British Museum nbsp Attributed to Alcamenes Ares Borghese type head Roman copy Capitoline MuseumsLow Classicism edit nbsp Bronze statue of Artemis Greek original Archaeological Museum of Piraeus nbsp Bust of Socrates Roman copy National Archaeological Museum of Naples nbsp Attributed to Euphranor Paris Roman copy Louvre Museum By the end of the 5th century B C Athens hegemony was in decline weakened by internal unrest and external wars and soon Sparta Corinth and Thebes became prominent However at the beginning of the 4th century B C Athens regained some of its power and prestige restored its democracy and its wealth grew again Even so politics became more and more complex having developed what is called the state apparatus and the polis lost its communitarian character At the same time Greek colonies around the Mediterranean multiplied some achieving great development with diversified and profitable economies that imitated the social model of the metropolitan polis The decentralization of culture throughout these regions and the rise of a wealthy merchant class consumers of art but with its own values opened the way for the appreciation of individual taste and the influence of foreign cultural elements dissolving the rigidity and austerity of High Classicism 32 33 In sculpture the concern with verisimilitude became even more pronounced Innovations in the stone carving technique allowed greater control in the finishing of details in the representation of robes and dresses and in the polishing of surfaces to obtain subtle effects of light and shadow The sculptors of the new generation introduced a general relaxation of Polykleitos canon developing a new repertoire of more dynamic attitudes of the body and setting aside the mathematically established proportions to create images convincing to the senses more similar to real world bodies with their physical idiosyncrasies and personal affections Thus began the period called Lower Classicism or Late Classicism The statues acquire an even more emphatic presence also a result of new detailed and realistic treatment given to the face hair and beard The individualized portrait was born an innovation attributed to Lysistratus the first according to Pliny the Elder to make molds of the model s face The goal was transferred from beautification to likeness inviting the spectator to meditate on the possible discrepancies between the moral value and the external appearance The realistic portraits of Socrates from this period whose appearance was notorious as well as his virtue exemplify the new dimension into which the art of bodily representation began to permeate 34 While the preferences of the expanding market were increasingly opening up to individual taste Plato s traditionalist and idealistic questionings of the role of mimesis in art plus his condemnation of the tragic raised problems for the validation of the artistic product that have not yet been fully resolved 35 36 37 The theoretical debate in the transition to Lower Classicism was advanced by Aristotle whose theory of catharsis contributed to the formulation of a new concept of art liberally avoiding the condemnation of popular culture and its typical emotionalism He also defended the representation of nonbeautiful objects based on the assumption that ugliness in art could be a source of teaching and aesthetic pleasure overcoming the sorrow that its contemplation in real life would cause Still Aristotle did not stop advising young individuals to prefer works by artists he qualified as ethical those whose creations best exemplified good human character because their influence would be beneficial to the entire polis Such ideas contributed to the fact that sculpture production continued to flourish meeting new needs but the closer approach to the natural did not mean a complete abandonment of the ideal Realism as a dominant trend would only appear in Greek sculpture with the succeeding Hellenistic school Lysippos still criticized sculptors who created works from the natural and prided himself on modeling men as they should be 38 39 40 41 In the field of sacred statuary there were also new aspects In the myths all mortals who saw gods in their glory died became blind insane or suffered in other ways The culture of the time was able to accept partial and imperfect representations of the gods Even shapeless stones trees and places could be recognized as receptacles for the divine and anthropomorphic cult statues could remain hidden or semi hidden by veils robes and various adornments requiring the devotee to exercise spiritual contemplation that did not require likeness to take place although it might be facilitated by an idol that looked beautiful or majestic or that more directly evoked the attributes of the god However thinkers like Plato considered the anthropomorphization of a deity to be unbecoming and misleading as it not only misrepresented its object but also demeaned it in an attempt to bring it too much into the sphere of the human To face these difficulties later sculptors made use of special resources to keep the distance between gods and men clear rescuing archaic stylistic traits such as frontality hieratic posture impassive and supernatural features which in contrast to the increasingly naturalistic and expressive style of profane statuary delimited well the spheres of the sacred and the mundane and forced the devotee to respect the idol as a reminder that the divine remains forever essentially unknowable When the representation of the deities was not directly linked to the cult as in monuments and decorative architectural reliefs there was greater formal freedom although some of the same conventions were observed and an attempt was made to maintain traits that well identified the divine aspect of the character 42 43 44 nbsp Praxiteles Aphrodite Braschi version of the Aphrodite of Knidos Roman copy Munich Glyptothek The emphasis on naturalism in statues also gave rise to consequences in the affective realm It was not unusual that in their function as stand ins for a person or a god statues were the object of intense love which could lead to the desire to get emotional and or sexual gratification from the statues From Pandora to Pygmalion myths relate various intimate interactions of statues with humans and historical records show that mortals could also fall into the temptation to seek from the simulacra Aristophanes warned against the risk of humans giving in to passions in front of statues or becoming too attached to them and being condemned to live as the living dead nurturing an ever incomplete love although he considered that from the inevitable frustration could be born the opportunity for the individual to discover themselves 45 Praxiteles Scopas and Lysippos edit See also Praxiteles Scopas and Lysippos Greek sculpture of the 4th century B C was dominated by three great figures Praxiteles Scopas and Lysippos Praxiteles is likely to have been the first to fully explore the sensual possibilities of marble The erotic appeal of his Aphrodite of Knidos the first completely nude female statue in Greek art made her famous in her day and gave rise to the prolific typological family of the Venus Pudica His Hermes and the Infant Dionysus illustrates his mastery in depicting the facial expression and grace of flexible sinuous bodies Scopas became known for the sense of drama violence dynamism and passion with which he imbued his works especially those he left in the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus the most important Greek architectural achievement in this period although in others he showed his ability to portray tranquility and harmony Lysippos reformulated the Polykleitos canon by reducing the dimensions of the head and making the figure more elongated though more massive He is also credited with the first statue whose finish was carried out equally in all directions the Apoxiomenon enabling the viewer to appreciate it not only from a single privileged point of view as was still the use of Polykleitos nbsp Attributed to Scopas Ludovisi Ares Roman copy National Roman Museum These masters along with other notable figures of their generation such as Leochares Bryaxis Cephisodotus the Elder Euphranor and Timotheus resolved all outstanding basic difficulties regarding form and technique that might still hinder the free expression of the idea in matter Thus they contributed with great achievements in the process of exploring human anatomy the representation of clothing and solving problems of composition being the link in the passage from the classical to the Hellenistic tradition as well as bringing the technique of stone carving and bronze modeling to an unprecedented level of quality The following generations would have little to add to the essence of classical art but would deepen their research into the portrayal of the emotional and the prosaic bringing marble sculpture to a level of true technical virtuosity 32 46 47 The study of the functions and meanings of classical sculpture is still progressing The reciprocal interactions and influences at various levels that categories uses and attributions might have established are not fully known and much remains to be elucidated about how representation influenced the construction of concepts and practices regarding gender status social inclusion affect sexuality aesthetics ideology politics religion ethics and the historical evolution of Greek society Part of such difficulty is due to the fact that many works are only known through literary references later copies are in an incomplete and damaged state or because their dating and attribution of authorship are often uncertain and the biographies of their creators have multiple gaps and inconsistencies 48 nbsp Cephisodotus the Elder Eirene bearing Plutus Roman copy Munich s Glyptothek nbsp Lysippos Apoxiomenon Roman copy Vatican Museums nbsp Amazonomachy frieze of the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus original nbsp Unknown author Dionysius Sardanapalo Roman copy National Roman Museum nbsp Antikythera Ephebe original National Archaeological Museum of Athens nbsp Attributed to Praxiteles Aphrodite of Syracuse Roman copy National Archaeological Museum of Athens nbsp Timothy Leda and the Swan Roman copy Capitoline Museums nbsp Lysippos Eros stringing his bow Roman copy Capitoline MuseumsOther uses and techniques editIn the purely technical field there were no radical advances in what the sculptors of the Archaic and Severe period had already achieved The Archaic marbles already showed a very high mastery of stone visible especially in their architectural reliefs In the case of bronze the main innovation in their history for Greek sculpture was the development of the lost wax technique but its principles were already masterfully handled in the Severe period with a diversified application Therefore Classicism benefited from the fact that the main sculptural techniques had already been refined enough that the main interest shifted to the aspects of form and meaning although always with some advances in refinement 49 Funeral sculpture edit nbsp Unknown author Funerary stele of Thrasea and Euandria original Pergamon Museum Among the uses of sculpture was the composition of funeral monuments where in general terms it shared the characteristics of decorative sculpture in temples and public buildings The tradition of building monuments to the dead existed since the Archaic period when the kouros fulfilled this function With the advent of democracy in the early 5th century B C customs began to change and funerary stelae relief plaques with inscriptions appeared After an irregular development as they disappeared in some periods in the Classic period they became a common practice in Attica while in other regions they would only become popular in Hellenism One of the first important stelae of Classicism is the Stela of Eufero dated c 430 B C its style showing a connection with the decorative sculpture of the Parthenon that was being created at the same time It has been a traditional thought that such monuments were the endowment of the wealthy but recent studies have indicated that their cost would have been much less than once thought which means the lower classes could commission a votive plaque although there were clear differences in luxury and sophistication between the burials of the common people and those of the great families The museums of classical archeology exhibit a great number of specimens Highlights are those of Late Classicism which show portraits of the deceased together with family members in scenes sometimes of great sensitivity and poetry 50 51 Terracottas edit Terracotta is an ancient technique however its application has been more common in pottery with sculptural uses limited to decorative objects and small statuettes for popular usage figuring actors animals and types of people These had generally no great technical refinement and repeated crudely the formal principles of large sculpture Larger and more refined pieces were rare and would appear more often with the Hellenistic schools from the late 4th century B C onward A rich artwork from Attica in the Louvre Museum is worth mentioning suggesting advanced practices in this field already during Classicism Elements of terracotta in architectural decoration had great use in earlier and later periods but in Classicism rarely occurred One type of terracotta that stands out is the statuettes with articulated limbs This group has likely performed specific functions They have been found in many tombs suggesting an association with Cthonic deities It is also speculated that they served as statues for domestic worship as offerings to the gods and as magical protection against evil forces Many of them have holes in the back of their heads indicating that they could be worn suspended which allowed free movement of their limbs It has been thought that they were children s dolls but their fragility preventing repeated handling does not support this assumption As for votive statues a great syncretism of styles is observed especially in Late Classicism when archaic traits continue to appear in quantity side by side with more progressive stylistic elements following the conventions of monumental cult statuary 52 53 54 55 nbsp Terracotta statuette with articulated limbs original Staatliche Antikensammlungen nbsp Leda and the Swan polychrome terracotta original Attica school Louvre Museum nbsp Terracotta theatrical mask model original British Museum nbsp Priapic statuette of an actor terracotta original Staatliche Antikensammlungen Goldsmithery edit Goldsmithery was present as a technique of miniaturized sculpture where there was significant production mainly in the colonies of Magna Grecia Cyprus and the southern Black Sea with finds in mainland Greece being rare Most of the jewelry of this phase is related to religious contexts decorating cult statues being votive offerings or celebratory as in the case of the gold crowns used in the apotheosis of politicians The use of personal jewelry was not uncommon Their quality while high is shown to be lower than the jewelry of the Archaic period The motifs represented are in general abstract animal and vegetal and the popularization of human forms happens at the end of the Classical period along with the appearance of the first cameos 56 Copies and Color edit See also Gods in Color nbsp Classic torso copy with attempted reconstitution of the original polychrome Bunte Gotter Exhibition The common practice of the ancient Greeks was to cover their statues and architectural reliefs with paint either partially or in its entirety seeking an even more striking resemblance than their simple form and structure could achieve For centuries it was thought that their works appeared to them as they do nowadays but in reality they were richly colored Studies suggest that in Classicism the use of color in sculpture was more discreet than in earlier periods Recently researchers have tried to reconstruct the polychromy of statues in specially made copies causing fascination and surprise as the usage of color differs from the one common today 57 58 59 49 nbsp Reduced bronze copy of the Diadumenos by Polykleitos BnF Museum Of great value for reconstructing the landscape of Greek sculpture are the miniature copies which were extremely popular and replicated in smaller scale virtually every formal model and every important work of monumental statuary a practice that was not limited to the Classical period Still some very successful subjects that were copied several times in their original size are not found in miniatures as is the case of Polykleitos Doryphoros It is likely that the absence of finds is due to the fact that these were loaded with such strong significance that their reduction would have seemed inappropriate The materials used for miniaturization were bronze marble ivory and eventually other stones Terracotta despite its versatility does not seem to have been considered a worthy material for the reproduction of celebrated works at least not during Classicism 60 Legacy and Perspectives editClassical art has exerted a vast influence throughout the history of the West as shown by the consensus among specialists The sculptural legacy of the classics continues to interest multitudes even today The very name classic indicates the unparalleled prestige they have acquired for in current parlance classic is that which establishes a measure by which other things of that kind are judged 61 Classical sculpture was in its origin one of the levers for the birth of Aesthetics as an autonomous branch of Philosophy Throughout history its formal models were used for the most varied purposes some of high humanistic inspiration but sometimes in opposition to that celebrating totalitarian regimes and personalisms of various kinds as it happened during Nazism and Fascism In modern appreciation the ideology underlying the sculpture of Greek Classicism does not remain free of criticism being said to glorify a way of life and a people to detriment of others and the collective to detriment of the individual suppressing the questioning of the instituted order under the appearance of homogeneity and consensus The execution of Socrates accused of impiety and corruption of youth by the same society that cultivated Classicism shows how perversion and misinterpretation can happen with the positive purposes of improvement and education of the collectivity for fuller citizenship a purer and more harmonious life and more advanced ethics principles that classical sculpture illustrated well On the other hand the criticism points to facets of a complex and contradictory social reality that were deliberately swept away from view in the art of that period 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 47 nbsp Chalimachus Memade Roman copy Prado Museum Classicism began its spread around the world through the Greek colonies scattered all around the Mediterranean and the Black Sea Alexander the Great took it further reaching India In these regions the principles of Greek sculpture were presented to the local populations and blending with their traditions gave rise to stylistic interpretations that more or less successfully reproduced the metropolitan aesthetic This eclectic and cosmopolitan synthesis was called Hellenism 70 Ancient Rome in turn was another avid recipient of classical Greek culture Its sculptors took pride in working under Greek inspiration and by multiplying copies of Greek originals that were later lost they were the transmitters to posterity of a significant part of the culture they imitated 71 From the legacy transmitted by the Romans early Christianity drew the models for starting its own art but after the sixth century its policy changed Until this time immense amounts of sculpture had survived in temples and ancient monuments but from then on their ubiquitous nudity began to be seen as an offense to Christian morality as well as being condemned as diabolical cult images and bad reminders of paganism Losing their former value ancient works began to be destroyed On the other hand during the Renaissance classical culture fell back into the elites favor and was the core of a recovery of the dignity of the body and of purely aesthetic pleasure Christianity itself after proscribing for centuries the pagan sculptural heritage recovered it transforming and adapting it to serve it and praise the heroes of the new order the saints and martyrs of the faith The Renaissance conception of art largely reproduces the idea formulated by the classical philosophers 64 63 The prestige that classical statuary knew in this period reached the borders of passion as can be seen in this excerpt by Giovanni Pietro Bellori nbsp Leochares Apollo Belvedere Roman copy Vatican Museums Painters and sculptors choosing from among the most elegant beauties of the natural world perfect the idea and their works surpass and stand above Nature which is the ultimate scope of these arts This is the origin of the veneration and awe we have for statues and paintings and from this derives the reward and honor of Artists this was the glory of Timantes Apeles Phidias and Lysippus and of so many others renowned for their fame all who rising above human forms achieved with their ideas and works an admirable perfection This Idea may then be called the perfection of Nature the miracle of art the clairvoyance of the intellect the example of the mind the light of imagination the rising sun which from the east inspires the statue of Menon and inflames the monument of Prometheus 72 For the Romantics especially in Germany Greece continued to be seen as a model of life and culture Nietzsche exclaimed Oh the Greeks They knew how to live Other scholars likewise despising the Roman filter began to cultivate the ideals of Greek Classicism to such an extent that a veritable Grecomania was created influencing all humanities and artistic forms 73 74 In Neoclassicism classical humanism was a significant impulse for the consolidation of democratic and republican concepts According to Winckelmann one of the mentors of the movement only the Greeks had managed to produce Beauty and for him and his colleagues the Apollo Belvedere was the most perfect achievement of sculpture of all time Winckelmann is also credited with the distinction between High and Low Classicism labeling the former as grand and austere and the latter as beautiful and flowing Meanwhile Classicism crossed the Atlantic and inspired the formation of the North American state and its school of sculpture 75 76 77 78 In the early twentieth century academic studies multiplied and were refined to unprecedented levels with the development of new methods of archaeological research and the improvement of the theoretical and instrumental apparatus 79 At the same time in a way officializing the intense love for the classics that since the 18th century had been cultivated by German intellectuals Classicism was co opted by the Nazis who saw in its formal models the glorified image of the Aryan race They saw in its values the basis for the formation of a pure society a healthy race and a strong state establishing it as a reference standard for state sponsored art and using it to justify the eradication of races and cultures deemed degenerate such as the Jews and modernist art 80 81 Mussolini tried to propose a similar model for Fascist Italy but it did not have much practical impact 74 The classical educational model began to lose vigor under the impact of the Modernist revolution and the ability of classical sculpture to inspire new artists rushed into a fulminant decline although it never disappeared at all This recovery was greatly encouraged by the post modernists for whom there was no point in destroying tradition as Modernism had proposed since this was tantamount to a loss of memory and past tantamount to the creation of a useless void Thus it would be better to appropriate and update it through conscious criticism appearing in the form of quotations allegories re readings and paraphrases which offer a retrospective view and commentary on the old tradition 74 nbsp Praxiteles Hermes and the Infant Dionysus possibly original Archaeological Museum of Olympia Today the formal patterns of classical Greek sculpture its humanism and emphasis on the nude have found a new way to impress society influencing the conception of beauty and practices regarding the body resurrecting a cultivation of the physical that was born with the Greeks and influences various customs related to sexuality and the concept of body in media culture At the same time a tendency is beginning to strengthen among art critics in the direction of abating the practically unanimous prestige that Modernism achieved and maintained for almost a century with its individualistic hermetic irrational abstracting anti historical and informal values beginning to be questioned In this sense the classical model may have a new attraction for artists and society in a context of updating the paideia rescuing a line of work inspired by classical humanism focused on the common good and the ethical and integral education of the public to which their works are directed in a historical moment in which the emphasis on technology along with consumerism the excessive specialization of trades wild urban life ecological problems the superficiality of mass culture and the loss of strong moral references have become threatening aspects for the well being and the very survival of the human race Cultural tourism to museums and archaeological sites has been seen as a positive force for the dissemination of classical culture and art to the general public although it may suffer from political manipulation and mercantilist degradation possibly giving strength to simplistic pasteurized and uncritical views of the past 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 In any case the presence of classical sculpture is still striking in Western culture and with the wide Western penetration throughout the world it has become known and appreciated globally At least as far as the West is concerned the appeal that the classical model has held throughout its history and still holds today attests to its persistent ability to stimulate the popular imagination and to be incorporated into a variety of cultural ethical social and political ideologies 63 91 The classical heritage in the history of sculpture edit nbsp Unknown author Pasquino Group 3rd century BC Hellenistic Roman copy nbsp Bust of Ptolemy I Soter 3rd century BC Hellenistic Egypt original nbsp Unknown author Genius of Emperor Domitian 1st 2nd century A D Roman original nbsp Unknown author The genius Hada 2nd century AD Gandhara culture original nbsp Unknown author The Good Shepherd 4th century paleochristian original nbsp Michelangelo David 1504 Renaissance nbsp Canova Perseus c 1800 neoclassical nbsp Unknown author The German Man 1934 Nazi artSee also editGods in Color Kalos kagathos PaideiaReferences edit a b Western Sculpture Ancient Greek The Classical period Early Classical c 500 450 bc Encyclopaedia Britannica On line BOARDMAN John Greek Art and Architecture In BOARDMAN John GRIFFIN Jasper amp MURRAY Oswin The Oxford History of Greece and the Hellenistic World Oxford University Press 1991 pp 330 331 HERSEY George Beauty is in the eye of a Greek chisel holder The Offer 31 May 1996 THOMAS Carol G Introduction In THOMAS Carol G ed Paths from Ancient Greece BRILL 1988 pp 1 5 GARDNER Percy The Lamps of Greek Art In LIVINGSTONE R W The Legacy of Greece Kessinger Publishing pp 353 WHITLEY James The Archaeology of Ancient Greece Cambridge University Press 2001 pp 3 4 POLLITT Jerome Art and experience in classical Greece Cambridge University Press 1972 pp 64 66 a b HEMINGWAY Colette amp HEMINGWAY Sean The Art of Classical Greece ca 480 323 B C In The Metropolitan Museum of Art Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History 2000 POLLITT p 66 POLLITT p 70 MORRIS Sarah Daidalos and the Origins of Greek Art Princeton University Press 1992 pp 363 364 POLLITT p 74 The period has a different chronology depending on the author consulted The Encyclopedia Britannica extends it to c 400 BC POLLITT pp 80 81 a b BOARDMAN GRIFFIN amp MURRAY p 332 LESSA Fabio de Souza Corpo e Cidadania em Atenas Classica In THEML Neyde BUSTAMANTE Regina Maria da Cunha amp LESSA Fabio de Souza orgs Olhares do corpo Mauad Editora Ltda 2003 pp 48 49 STEINER Deborah Images in mind Statues in Archaic and Classical Greek Literature and Thought Princeton University Press 2001 pp 26 33 35 BEARDSLEY Monroe Aesthetics from classical Greece to the present University of Alabama Press 1966 pp 27 28 a b STEINER pp 39 40 STEWART Andrew Notes on the Reception of the Polykleitan Style Diomedes to Alexander In MOON Warren G ed Polykleitos the Doryphoros and Tradition University of Wisconsin Press 1995 pp 248 249 STEWART pp 247 253 TANNER Jeremy Social Structure Cultural Racionalisation and Aesthetic Judgement in Classical Greece In RUTTER N Keith amp SPARKES Brian Word and image in ancient Greece Edinburgh University Press 2000 pp 185 ss HURWIT Jeffrey The Doryphoros Looking Backward In MOON Warren G ed Polykleitos the Doryphoros and Tradition University of Wisconsin Press 1995 pp 3 7 STEINER p 40 HURWITT Jeffrey The Parthenon and the Temple of Zeus at Olympia In BARRINGER Judith amp POLLITT Jerome eds Periklean Athens and its Legacy University of Texas Press 2005 pp 135 142 MURRAY John A History of Greek Sculpture Vol II Under Pheidias and his Successors Adamant Media Corporation 1883 2005 pp 9 13 17 20 LAPATIN Kenneth The Statue of Athena and other Treasures in the Parthenon In NEILS Jennifer The Parthenon Cambridge University Press 2005 pp 261 ss STEWART p 254 STEINER pp 34 35 42 HALLIWELL Stephen Plato and Painting In RUTTER N Keith amp SPARKES Brian Word and image in ancient Greece Edinburgh University Press 2000 pp 101 102 TANNER p 183 a b Western Sculpture Ancient Greek The Classical period Late Classical period c 400 323 bc Encyclopaedia Britannica online MOSSE Claude Athens in Decline 404 86 B C Routledge 1973 pp 21 22 25 STEINER pp 57 58 62 65 HALLIWELL Stephen The Aesthetics of Mimesis Ancient Texts and Modern Problems Princeton University Press 2000 pp 37 ss 72 ss 98 ss HALLIWELL pp 107 108 TANNER p 197 BOARDMAN p 331 SIFAKIS Gregory Michael Aristotle on the Function of Tragic Poetry Crete University Press 2001 pp 40 42 46 48 STEINER p 35 ENGGASS Robert amp BROWN Jonathan Italian and Spanish Art 1600 1750 Sources and Documents Northwestern University Press 1992 p 10 SIFAKIS pp 73 ss STEINER pp 85 93 SPIVEY Nigel Bionic Statues In POWELL Anton ed The Greek World Routledge 1995 pp 448 450 SPIVEY pp 454 445 JANSON Horst Woldemar History of Art Prentice Hall PTR 2003 pp a b Late Classical Era Sculpture c 400 323 BCE Encyclopedia of Irish and World Art KAMPEN Natalie Boymel Epilogue Gender and Desire In KOLOSKI OSTROW Ann Olga amp LYONS Claire L eds Naked Truths Routledge 1997 pp 267 269 a b Ancient Greek Sculpture Encyclopedia of Irish and World Art OLIVER Graham John Athenian Funerary Monumentos Style Grandeur and Cost In OLIVER Graham John ed The Epigraphy of Death Studies in the History and Society of Greece and Rome Liverpool University Press 2000 pp 59 79 STEARS Karen The Times They Are A Changing Developments in Fifth Century Funerary Sculpture In OLIVER Graham John ed The Epigraphy of Death Studies in the History and Society of Greece and Rome Liverpool University Press 2000 pp 25 58 ROBERTSON Donald Struan Greek and Roman architecture Cambridge University Press 1969 p 195 MURATOV Maya B Greek Terracotta Figurines with Articulated Limbs In The Metropolitan Museum of Art Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History 2000 MERKER Gloria Corinth The Sanctuary of Demeter and Kore Terracotta Figurines of the Classical Hellenistic and Roman Periods The American School of Classical Studies at Athens 2000 p 23 BARTMAN Elizabeth Ancient Sculptural Copies in Miniature BRILL 1992 p 20 HIGGINS Reynold Alleyne Greek and Roman jewellery Taylor amp Francis 1961 pp 122 134 Department of Greek and Roman Art Roman Copies of Greek Statues In The Metropolitan Museum of Art Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History 2000 McQUAID Cate Sculpture show of a different color The Boston Globe 6 January 2008 BENSON J L Greek Color Theory and the Four Elements University of Massachusetts Amherst 2000 BARTMAN pp 16 ss WHITLEY p 269 BOLGAR R R The classical heritage and its beneficiaries Cambridge University Press 1973 pp 1 ss a b c HERSEY a b Greek Sculpture Encyclopedia of Irish and World Art TANNER p 10 OSBORNE Robin Archaic and Classical Greek Art Oxford University Press p 240 THOMAS pp 1 5 187 ss LIVINGSTONE R W The Legacy of Greece Kessinger Publishing 2005 GREEN Peter Classical Bearings Interpreting Ancient History and Culture University of California Press 1998 pp 17 18 TSETSKHLADZE Gocha R Introduction In TSETSKHLADZE Gocha R ed Ancient Greeks West and East BRILL 1999 pp vii ss JENKYNS Richard The Legacy of Rome In JENKYNS Richard ed The Legacy of Rome Oxford University Press 1992 pp 1 5 ENGASS amp BROWN p 15 BEHLER Ernst The Force of Classical Greece in the Formation of Romantic Age in Germany In THOMAS Carol G ed Paths from Ancient Greece Brill 1988 p 118 ss a b c Squire Michael The Legacy of Greek Sculpture In Palagia Olga ed Handbook of Greek Sculpture Walter de Gruyter 2019 pp 657 689 FEJFER Jane Wiedewelt Winkelmann and Antiquity In FEJFER Jane FISCHER HANSEN Tobias amp RATHJE Annette The rediscovery of antiquity 10 Acta Hyperborea 2003 University of Copenhagen Museum Tusculanum Press p 230 GONTAR Cybele Neoclassicism In The Metropolitan Museum of Art Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History 2000 TOLLES Thayer American Neoclassical Sculptors Abroad In The Metropolitan Museum of Art Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History 2000 WHITLEY p 270 WEISBERG Ruth Twentieth Century Rhetoric Enforcing Originality and Distancing the Past In GAZDA Elaine K ed The ancient art of emulation University of Michigan Press 2002 p 26 Sauquet Mathilde Propaganda Art in Nazi Germany The Revival of Classicism In The First Year Papers 2010 present Trinity College Digital Repository Hartford 2014 Redner Harry Dialectics of Classicism The birth of Nazism from the spirit of Classicism In Thesis Eleven 2019 152 1 19 37 DUAYER Juarez Lukacs e a atualidade da defesa do realismo na estetica marxista UNICAMP sd PIZA Daniel Nos que eramos tao modernos O Estado de S Paulo 16 December 2007 CLAIBORNE Lise Beyond Readiness New Questions about Cultural Understanding and Developmental Appropriateness In KINCHELOE Joe The Praeger Handbook of Education and Psychology Greenwood Publishing Group 2007 P 434 BOLGAR pp 380 393 GREEN p 16 TYMIENIECZKA Anna Teresa The Theme Philosophy Phenomenology of Life inspiring Education for Our Times In TYMIENIECZKA Anna Teresa ed Paideia Springer 2000 pp 2 3 Walsh Kevin 1992 The Representation of the Past Museums and Heritage in the Postmodern World Routledge ISBN 9780415079440 SHANKS Michael Classical Archaeology of Greece Routledge 1996 pp 176 ss LIVINGSTONE Richard Winn Greek ideals and modern life Biblo amp Tannen Publishers 1969 p 1 AGARD Walter Raymond The Greek Tradition in Sculpture Ayer Publishing 1950 p 8Notes edit However as happens in all processes of artistic evolution any dates that are rigorously defined usually prove to be inaccurate and subject to dispute there always being elements of transition before and after the period in question making the spectrum diffuse and difficult to characterize thus adopting delimitations established by tradition External links editGreek Art Encyclopedia of Irish and World Art Western Sculpture Ancient Greek The Classical period Encyclopaedia Britannica On line Greek Art and Architecture Encyclopedia Encarta Archived 28 October 2009 at the Wayback Machine Portals nbsp the arts nbsp Greece Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Classical Greek sculpture amp oldid 1206028398, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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