[MUSIC PLAYING]
DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: In ancient Greece,
people did not use soap and water to wash, they used oil.
And we're seeing a sculpture called
the "Scraper" or the "Apoxyomenos"
by Lysippos, which shows just that.
This is an athlete whose body is now
covered with perspiration and dust.
And what he's doing is he's washing himself, first
by covering his body with oil, and then using a strigil
to scrape all the grime off with the oil.
DR. BETH HARRIS: Lysippos was one
of the most famous sculptors from the fourth century BCE.
But, of course, we're not looking at the actual work
by Lysippos of the Apoxyomenos.
We're looking at an ancient Roman
copy of marble of what was a Greek bronze original.
DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: But even though it's a copy,
it can give us a tremendous amount of information.
Lysippos is known for having changed the proportional canon
that we associate with the High Classical tradition in Greece.
This is the fourth century, and what Lysippos has done
is to elongate the body and to reduce the size of the head.
DR. BETH HARRIS: And it's very obvious,
when you compare this with a fifth-century sculpture
of the Classical period by Polycleitus,
who was the sculptor who established that canon.
DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: In the Doryphoros,
if you look at Polycleitus' sculpture,
and you measure the size of the head, the length of the body
is seven heads tall.
But Lysippos has added a full head's worth of length.
So, if you were to measure this, this
is eight head lengths tall.
And because the head is smaller, and the body is taller,
it gives us a sense of, as we look up
at this sculpture on a podium, that the figure is
even taller than he is.
DR. BETH HARRIS: And Lysippos has done some other view
things.
He's reached the figure's arm into space, where the figure is
scraping the oil from his body.
And by doing that, he breaks out of the frontal orientation
of Classical sculpture and makes us
want to move around the figure so can see it
from different directions.
DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: That's right.
There is, perhaps, a fairly ideal position
to view this sculpture from, his front left.
But, nevertheless, I can't see his chest.
And so I do want to move around.
Now, this was a bronze originally.
So that tree trunk was not there in the original sculpture.
It wasn't necessary.
Bronze has enough tensile strength,
so you don't need that.
And you can see that there's actually
a fragment of a couple of bridges
that were meant to first support the marble arms, which
have broken and then been repaired.
But, nevertheless, even in the original bronze,
I would have wanted to walk around this.
DR. BETH HARRIS: No question.
DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: But even though Lysippos is introducing
these very new innovations-- again, this change
of the proportion of the body, this breaking
of the frontal plane of the sculpture--
he's still very much embedded in the great Greek tradition
of representing the nude athlete,
this idealized human body.
DR. BETH HARRIS: And, of course, Lysippos' figure
stands in contrapposto, which was invented by the Greeks
in the Classical period.
DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: It's such a gorgeous example
of contrapposto, and of the body as a whole.
Look at the musculature.
We really feel the power of this athlete,
even though it's presumably now after his exercises.
DR. BETH HARRIS: From sources, we
hear that Lysippos was associated
with Alexander the Great, the great military leader that
conquered Greece and spread Greek ideas
throughout the Mediterranean.
And he's said to have sculpted Alexander.
Too bad none of those sculptures survive.
DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: We're seeing the sculpture in the Vatican,
because antiquities were treasured by Renaissance popes,
and subsequently.
But, of course, we're looking at a structure that
is pagan, and pagan in its celebration
of human achievement, in human beauty,
as opposed to the spiritual.
But it is striking to see this sculpture in such
a religious institution.
DR. BETH HARRIS: And so many ancient Greek and Roman
sculptures all around us here in the Vatican museum.
DR. STEVEN ZUCKER: One last detail,
which is the room in which the sculpture is displayed
apparently was a room that Leonardo da Vinci
occupied briefly.
Leonardo, of course, this stepping stone
back to this reverence for the body,
even within the Catholic tradition.
[MUSIC PLAYING]