Chapter 14—Classical Art: Greece and Rome

Chapter 14—Classical Art: Greece and Rome

Introduction: This chapter explores the art we today call Classical. We will examine some of the Greek and Roman influences on modern thinking and how those influences developed in their own time, beginning with a proto-culture period, moving through the Geometric, Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic periods for Greek culture and the Etruscan Culture, the Republic Period, and the Early and Late Empire Periods for Italy and its Roman Empire. We will glimpse historical events—such as war, governmental changes, and even transitions from one ruler to a new one—that influenced the arts. You will be able to better understand artistic developments in the Renaissance, Baroque, Modern, and Contemporary art periods that were based upon reviving aspects of the Classical arts. In A Closer Look – The Women Weavers of Ancient Greece, the role of women in art and Greek culture is examined, along with another great story—that of Penelope, Odysseus' wife, and her weaving/unweaving strategy to avoid remarriage while faithfully awaiting her husband’s return.

Chapter 14 – Why Read It? Have you ever read Pericles’ oration to the Athenians after they defeated the Persians at Marathon? Or any of the Greek myths and legends, such as the story of Perseus and Danaë, or Theseus and the Great Minotaur in his fearful labyrinth on the isle of Minos? Many themes from the Greeks are echoed throughout Western civilization. Monuments to war and government buildings in Washington, D. C., and elsewhere are modeled after Greek architecture such as the Parthenon or the great theatre of Epidaurus. Our principles of design and our ideas of what is aesthetically pleasing are deeply rooted in Greek ideals such as balance, proportion, and unity. Coinage systems, boat or battleship designs, war strategies, and concepts of government are modifications of what the Greeks thought of centuries ago. When it comes to art, we begin to see a theme of Classicism forming and then being emulated by the Romans, later by Renaissance artists, and again in modern times by the Neoclassicists and the Post-Modern artists and architects.

Why should we read about and learn about Greek and Roman art? Why study architectural feats such as the Pantheon or the Colosseum? Or look at sculpture from the Ara Pacis Augustae altar, or the oracle temple at Delphi? Why study wall paintings from Pompeii? In studying these works, we will be laying a foundation for our artistic understanding of Western art, and why we believe some art to be aesthetically pleasing and other art of our own time period to be historically connected to the Classical past, and still other art disturbingly disconnected. We will also be better able to understand and appreciate differences in art from India, China, Japan, Africa, Native Americans, or Oceana (Chapter 18) and the variations and similarities in uses of the aesthetic principles, sacred geometry, and beauty.

Try doing a little background reading on Greek or Roman mythology, history, and battles. How did the Greeks affect the Egyptians? How did the Romans later affect the Greeks, the Germans, and even the English? What kinds of connections can you find to your own sense of what art should be? Where can you go to see a work of art bearing an influence from the ancient Greeks or the Romans? On our campus at Colorado State University, the administration building and other buildings on campus are modeled after the Greek architectural style. A fountain in the courtyard of our Student Center has water spouting from the mouths of a row of ram’s heads, making it a place where a Roman citizen from the Empire period would feel quite comfortable. Portraits of important figures from the history of CSU, Fort Collins, the region, etc., line the hallway of various buildings, recalling the life-like portrait busts of the Romans and the mummy portraits from the tombs near Pompeii or Etruria. Look around you and discover the roots of the civilization in which you are immersed. Even our celebration of sports and the continued celebration of the Olympics every four years are rooted in our ancient past.

Understanding Concepts: Placing art into its historical perspective will help you remember specific characteristics and changes in styles. Looking at timelines will help.

1. Continue to search for a couple of historical timelines, either in books or website sources. Some timelines may include images of art from the time periods mentioned: Geometric, Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic for Greece, and Republic and Early and Late Empire for Italy. You may have to search several sources to find more Etruscan examples than are in our text.

• Make a list of examples and the traits of artwork in your text for each period below:

[start Table]

Time Period Pottery Sculpture Painting Architecture Other

Geometric Greece

Archaic Greece

Classical Greece

Hellenistic Greece

Etruscan

Republic Period Roman

Early Empire Roman

Late Empire Roman

[end Table]

Making Connections: As you read Chapter 14 you may realize that many of the ideas presented here relate to aspects of modern life. You are also presented with a hefty bit of familiar “namedropping” of figures from Greek and Roman history and literature: Plutarch, Pericles, Aristotle, Socrates, Alexander the Great, Plato, Sophocles, Aristophanes, Aeschylus, Hesiod, Archimedes, Homer, Euclid, and Pythagoras.

1. Research two of the people listed above, briefly surveying and investigating the ideas, philosophies, historical or legendary events, and mathematical and observational principles connected to them—ideas that essentially laid the foundation for Western civilization. Make your notes below:

2. This chapter names specific artists that are known creators of individual works of art and of stylistic trends or changes: Myron, Ictinos and Callicrates, Polykleitos, Euxithios and Euphronios, Praxiteles, Phidias, Lysippos, and Alexandros, Athenodoros, and Polydoros of Rhodes.

• Select two of these creators and take note of how they integrated specific principles, ideals, harmonic relationships and measurements into their works.

Artist Specific Artwork Ideas Integrated, Innovations

• How did some of the ideals and principles in the literature and mathematics of the Greeks find expression in the arts of the times?

3. How did the same ideas appeal to and influence artists and architects from later time periods, such as the Renaissance, the Baroque, the Neoclassical period, or for that matter, contemporary art? (See Chapters 16, 17, 19, and 20.)

• Select two works of art from these later chapters and compare them to works in this chapter. For example, you could compare the figure of Venus in Sandro Botticelli's Birth of Venus (image 16-15) to the figure of Doryphoros by Polykleitos in terms of stance and proportions.

Artwork from Later Period/Artist Comparison to A Greek Work

4. Edgar Allan Poe is quoted in this chapter referring to Greece and Rome.

• Briefly investigate this writer's life and interests.

• How does his quotation tie in with the subject of his poems and stories?

• From which of his poems is this specific quotation taken?

5. In A Closer Look – The Women Weavers of Ancient Greece, you are invited to view the way in which women were depicted and the roles they carried out in ancient times. In this particular example from a vase, the art of weaving and its integral role in the daily lives of women are explored, including the story of Penelope and Odysseus, and her prolonged weaving and secretive nocturnal unweaving of a shroud.

• How are women depicted in art from ancient cultures? Find another example in our text.

• What names of women can you find emerging from Greek or Roman histories?

• Why are virtually no women artists’ names known?

• Explore the vital role of the weaving and ceramic arts in helping historians and archaeologists gain information about ancient cultures.

• What do you imagine life to have been like for women, men and children in ancient Greece? In Roman times?

• What are some resources you can use to find out more about everyday life of ancient times? Notes:

Taking Notes: This chapter takes you into a specific realm of art for the culture of the Greeks, Etruscans, and Romans. Specific as it is, it still only presents you with a small number of artworks, many well known, from these cultures. Your instructor will probably present more works, such as murals from Etruscan tombs, other pediment and freestanding sculptures from Greece, details of the interior of the Pantheon, or possibly, a computer reconstruction of the Colosseum in Rome, as appeared in the recent film Gladiator. Be prepared to take notes, not only for the 34 images shown in the text, but also on others.

1. As you create your template for taking notes, listing the titles from the text, make sure you have extra room or pages for noting and sketching details from other images that may be shown in class. (Example: The awning for the Roman Colosseum was called the ___[term]___, and was created using ___ .)

2. As you review and define the nearly 60 vocabulary terms, notice how many of them refer to art movements or periods, philosophical ideas, and techniques and methods for Greek pottery and architecture and Roman architecture. Organize the terms according to this structure and you will see that the chapter itself is organized in similar fashion.

• Spend some time looking through a good dictionary and you will see that many words in the English language we use today have their roots or origins in Greek or Latin words. If you can remember some of the word roots, you may be able to better link a vocabulary term or concept to the work of art shown to represent this idea. This will come in handy during a test! (For example, the word acropolis comes from the Greek akron, meaning top, and polis, meaning city. That should make it easier to remember where the Athenian Parthenon is!)

• Note characteristic differences and methods for black-figure ware and red-figure ware.

• What were some of the various pottery forms used?

• Distinguish between the characteristics of Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian architectural orders. Sketch them below:

[insert UNF-p.102-1 here]

3. Briefly, what are the basic premises for:

• Humanism (Philosophy):

• Stoicism (Philosophy):

• Naturalism (Art style):

• Idealism (Art style):

• How does the Greek canon of proportion differ with that of the Egyptians?

4. What is the weight-shift principle? How does the weight-shift principle differ from the S-curve principle? (Example: Make a quick sketch of weight shift. Try sketching the S-curve next to it to illustrate your notes.)

[insert UNF-p.103-1 here]

Preparing for Tests: You have probably realized how connected the philosophical ideas of the Greeks and Romans are to their artistic principles. This chapter covers concepts delving into philosophy, aesthetics, daily life, and war, as well as the specific approaches to making art and how art changed from time period to time period. This kind of relatedness provides your instructor with a virtually limitless supply of possible test question topics in the chapter.

1. As you review for a test over this material, use the resources provided by your text. Note how the chapter is divided into sections, each devoted to illustrating some of the highlights and differences between art styles. For example, the art of the Archaic period is quite different from that of the Classical period.

• Besides the dates of each time period, take note of changes and innovations the artists made as they built on previous styles and modified them.

• Study the works of art so you can identify a work from the late Classical period of Greece and distinguish it from an Imperial sculpture from Rome.

• Make sure you can differentiate an Etruscan tomb sculpture from an Archaic Greek pediment sculpture. These are the kinds of differences your instructor will be emphasizing in class and will feel comfortable creating test questions about.

Sample Questions from Chapter 13; answers to multiple-choice questions are found at the end of this chapter:

•         Image 14-31 The Ara Pacis altar was created during the reign of:
A. Augustus            B. Julius Caesar
C. Marcus Aurelius            D. Constantine

• Image 14-14, Hermes and Dionysos
What time period is this sculpture from?
A. Archaic Greek B. Late Roman Empire C. Late Classical Greek D. Etruscan

• Image 14-13, Niobid Painter

This is a pottery form known as a red-figure ___ , from the Classical period.

A. amphora B. krater

C. vase D. jug

• Sample essay question: Compare Greek and Roman art using two specific works
of architecture, one Greek and one Roman, or two specific works of sculpture,
one Greek and one Roman. Be specific, pointing out details that are similar as
well as those that are different. [Extended Essay Assignment: 2 pages minimum,
double-spaced, 12-point font. Cite any research sources used. (Citations should
not be part of the two-page length).]

Test questions can also be specific to identifying a specific style, recalling a story, or assigning correct iconography to an object in a work of art. Review sample questions in Understanding Art website (www.cengage.com/art/fichner-rathus9e), in the Student Test Packet, or on the ArtExperience Online for Understanding Art.

Enhancing Your Observational Powers: By using your visual senses and tuning in to certain human characteristics, you can learn more about where ancient artists got their innovative inspirations.

1. Observe the way people stand while they are waiting at a bus stop or in line at the grocery store. How closely do they approximate the weight-shift principle?

2. Try standing in the differing sculptural positions yourself, first approximating the stance of the Archaic Kouros figure, then moving into a stance similar to that of Polykleitos’s Doryphoros (Spear bearer) or Lysippos’s Apoxyomenos. What does each pose feel like? Which feels more natural? Now move into a pose similar to the The Dying Gaul. What transition occurred, as you assumed this pose? Record your notes on the following page:

• Archaic Kouros pose:

• Doryphoros or Apoxyomenos pose:

• Dying Gaul pose:

3. Walk around town or campus and see if you can find buildings with specific Greek or Roman architectural features.

• How closely do these approximate the original concept from which they were borrowed? Notes:

• Can you find a volute column or two? A pediment façade on the front of an older town hall or government building? A basilica-shaped structure, near some type of open plaza? Notes:

4. Find a location with figurative sculpture—perhaps a park or sculpture garden that is part of a war memorial. Did the sculptor use any of the "classicizing" features mentioned in this chapter such as a slightly turned head, weight-shift, or the appearance of balanced movement? Record your observations and notes below:

5. List a couple of influences from Classical culture that are still in use today. (Hint: the principles on which university studies are based derive from the ancient "Stoas," stalls in marketplaces where teachers held their classrooms in Greek times. Or consider the Olympics, coinage systems, or ballot casting—Greeks used hunks of tile to cast votes).

For More Understanding: Your text mentions examples of architecture from Greek and Roman cultures within Chapter 11. Later, in Chapters 15, 16, 17, and 19 the Classical elements of art and philosophy are discussed as they were revived in the Romanesque, Renaissance, Baroque, and Modern Periods. In fact, many contemporary art works somehow rework elements referring to Classical ideals, either to refresh them in culture—as in the architecture of Michael Graves—or to somehow play off them, or even satirize them. Study and research some of these readily available examples in order to enhance your understanding of these cultures and their Classical artifacts.

Visit the website for Understanding Art (www.cengage.com/art/fichner-rathus9e), which features a glossary and audio pronunciation guide, sample test questions, and more.

ArtExperience Online for Understanding Art: Locate writing on the Greek, Etruscan, and Roman cultures and view examples of art from each time period. Use flashcard section to view images and figure drawings seen in this chapter.

Also learn more about the information and artwork presented in the Compare and Contrast and A Closer Look sections.

The special Art Tour feature will virtually put you in the ancient city of Rome.

Notes and Links to Remember:

(answers to sample multiple-choice questions: a, c, b)