3D Human figure

from Geometric

to Archaic period

The Dark Ages and Geometric Period

The Orientalizing Styles

Eastern styles in Crete

The Daedalic style

Other early Archaic Statuary

Marble and monumental statuary (to about 570 BC)

Kouroi

Korai

Perirrhanteria

Artists and authors

Text book:

THE DARK AGES AND

GEOMETRIC PERIOD

• No monumental sculptury

• Tradition of BA: clay figurines (human or

animals)

• They were treated as common pottery

(hand made, painted, fired or wheel made

– on Crete)

• Votive offering, grave furniture

EGP:

- Centaures and other

creatures

- First votive bronze figurines

8th C • Renaissance of Art

• New cities, new sanctuaries

• Large “votive” market

• Small figurines of clay or bronze

• Lost mould: wax model => every pc original

• Geometric shape of bodies

• End of GP: inscriptions: donator, address etc.

THE ORIENTALIZING STYLES

Eastern styles in Crete and Greece

- The earliest surviving sculpture in Iron Age

Greece is from CRETE

- Limestone head from Amnisos

• Small relief from the frieze

• Not datable context

• Stylistically connected to Syria or Hittites

• End of 9th C, no later than 8th C

• Bronze cult figurines from Apollo temple at

Dreros

• 2nd half of 8th C

• “sphyrilato” – sheet fixed on wooden core

and hammered

• Up to 7th C

The Daedalic style

• Characteristic example: AUXERRE GODDESS

Lady of Auxerre

• Probably rom Crete

• Limestone

• Dress, shape of head, hair – Daedalic

• Hair is also remaining Egypt and Near

east

• Only frontal view expected

“Small decorative style”

• Male statuettes are naked

• Females are dressed

• Workshops on Crete, Peloponese, Melos,

Thera, Rhodes, Boeotia

• Mid. of 7th C

Other Early Archaic Statuary • Small figures of a large variety

• Statues are remaining Daedalic style

• Also ivory

• More freedom and creativity

• More different materials

• More independent figures

• Crete remains “more Daedalic”

• Sphinx same as on the pottery

• Olympia: important source of votives

• Wood must be common material

Youth from Samos

MARBLE

AND THE MONUMENTAL

to about 570 BC

The first marble sculptures

Pharaon Psammetichos I. (664 – 610) =>

Greeks settled in Egypt = crucial moment

for Greek statuary

- Statues of natural size and larges

- Made from hard stones, standing, seated

New materials

• Soft stones (limestone,

sandstone, tuff etc.)

can be worked by

same tools as wood

• Hard rocks (marble

and other crystalites)

must be worked by

different ways.

• In Egypt - abrasion

• In Greece – curving

by iron tools

Unfinished work (Paros)

• Marbles from Naxos and Paros

• Pentelic marbles – since mid of 6th C

• Surface was not polished, was painted

Figure planning methods

• Egyptian sculptors

laid out preliminary

sketches

• Grid of 21 squares

form eye line to the

soles of the feet

• Greek kouros has a

similar scale

Kouroi

• An upright stance with

straight or lightly flexed arm

at the sides

• One leg is slightly advanced

(usually left) -> impression

of walking & more secure

stability of the statue

• Hands are empty

• Islands kouroi wear belts

• Warriors helmet

• Boot are exceptional

• Young mature (or adolescents)

• Until 600 BC very uniform style

Dipylon head

• They are not cult statues

• Service to the deity

• Most of them from Apollo temples (also

from Poseidon temple in Sounion, from

temples of Athena in Athens and Hera on

Samos

• Grave markers

• In 7th C still daedalic elements

Sounion kouros

Kleobis and Bitton = twins of Argos

- Part of sculptor’s name: …medes of Argos

- Dedication of Argives to Delphi

Kouros from Syracuse

Korai

• Same purpose as the kouros

• Fewer of them are funerary

statues

• Servants of female deities

• Early exemplars are fully

daedalic

Head of Hera (Olympia)

Perirrhanteria

• Shallow water basins supported by 3 or 4

female figures who in most cases stand on

or beside lions holding them by tail and

lead

• The figures are up to1 m tall

• Origin from Cyprus and Syria

• There are not Daedalic

Artists and Authors

• Anonymous artists

• Contemporary texts tell almost nothing about statuary

• First information from Diodorus

- First statue of god was made by Telchines from Rhodes, who was a wizard. He was author of Colossos after Diodorus. His sculptures could speak and walk.

Pausanias

• Smilis of Aegina has made the cult image

of Hera on Samos

• Daedalus pupils Dipoinos and Skyllis were

born on Crete and working on

Peloponesse

• Daedalus – that who makes miracles

(probably later personification of those

early monumental styles)

Next lecture:

6th C BC architecture