Hi! This lecture reviews some of the key works from the Late Classical and Hellenistic
periods
associated with each Greece, so we're moving out of the classical period when
we
see the height of power in Athens, and we move into a
period of the Peloponnesian War, so the Peloponnesian War
is a period where fighting
goes in stages over a period of about thirty years
so from about 431 BCE to 404 BCE.
The Peloponnese is an area around here, and basically you had cities either
siding
with Athens or siding with Sparta, and these two
powers of the area Greece were fighting one another
over this long period. Eventually Athens will
lose, and their government system will change,
and at that point they still remain a cultural and artistic center,
but they're no longer the political power that they once were
during what's considered the Golden Age or Classical Period
of the mid fifth century BCE, so
we're entering into a new period politically, and, in terms of warfare, this is a period
that
begins to tear Athens apart to a certain extent,
so as we move she is me late classical period
this is a period where we are moving out of that Classical Style or
style that's sometimes considered the Golden Age style Athens
in at the 5th century BCE -- when we tend to think of the style as
nearly perfect. So, we're moving toward strong naturalism in the Classical
period.
Figures tend to not have a lot of emotion displayed
in their faces, but as we move towards the Late Classical and Hellenistic
period, we
will start to see this changed. Works of art become a little bit less
conservative, and we start to see more emotion, especially in the Hellenistic
period.
So, the label "Late Classical" typically indicates to art historians that we're
moving into a period of decline,
however, we do see some important artistic contributions during this Late
Classical period.
And, the work of art that we're going to focus on is
a work by Praxiteles, who's considered a very significant
Late Classical sculptor. The work that we're seeing here is a
Roman copy -- remember that a lot of these works only survive
to us as Roman copies because so many of them were lost as bronze originals,
or the originals were just never passed down, so
luckily the Romans appreciated the Greek aesthetic -- the Greek style of sculptures,
and created their own copies. So,
this is the "Aphrodite of Knidos", so Knidos is a small island
over on the side -- off the shore of modern-day Turkey,
and the "Aphrodite of Knidos" became very well known because it was a nude
representation at the female form, so if you recall back to the Archaic period
when we saw the "Peplos Kore"
who was a female figure who was very covered up wearing a traditional
peplos, so remember that traditionally
the male form could nude -- it was considered quite heroic and beautiful,
but the female form in the Archaic period was
very much covered up. However,
by the 4th century -- so this period of about 350 to 340 BCE --
we do see some new styles of sculptures being produced, where we're seeing a nude female.
Of course this Aphrodite -- the goddess of love and lust -- so
it perhaps is considered more appropriate to have her represented
in the nude or at least made it possible. Maiden goddesses like Artemis
or like Athena, it would be quite scandalous if they were represented in
the nude, but nevertheless this sculpture was quite scandalous
and eventually people of Knidos accepted it,
and it was probably displayed in some kind of round temple where people could really
move around it, and see it from all sides,
so that's one possibility for its display. The moment that we're seeing
here is we're catching her in a moment either
where she's about to bathe or she's just finishing up her bathing,
but it's as if we've caught her, and she covering up her genitalia.
She's reaching for garment -- it's covering up a hydria, which is a vase
that holds water.
You can just see the handle of it here -- presumably the original
would not have this strut connecting it, but because the Romans typically
carved their sculptures out at marbles, and it lacks a certain amount of strength
you need to have these little supports,
so the struts provide that support, so
this style of sculpture becomes very important. This style of
Venus or Aphrodite covering herself up --
catching her in this moment -- we sometimes call the gesture where she's covering up
both genitalia and her breasts
as the "Venus pudica" gesture -- the modest Venus pose.
So, this would presumably be quite exciting to kind of catch her
in a moment where she least expects it, so
that would add to the excitement of the sculpture. Next we move into the
Hellenistic period,
so there was a period when Alexander the Great becomes quite powerful.
Alexander will take control the area
southern Greece -- his father will take control of it -- Philip
will take control then Alexander comes into power, and they're able to
spread the power
of the Macedonians throughout the area
of Mesopotamia, through Egypt, all the way into Persia
and over towards Indida, so the empire that he's able to establish --
in a relatively short amount of time -- he rules from 336
at the point of the assassination of his father until his death in 323 BCE.
So his period at his death becomes known as the Hellenistic period:
so his death up until the death of Cleopatra and Marc Anthony
at the point when Augustus is coming to power in Rome. This is known as the
Hellenistic period. It's a period when the Empire
of Alexander is broken up into pieces
among the generals of Alexander. You can see
there are different parts of the empire here -- here's the part controlled by Ptolemy.
There's another part
here, another part here, part here, and there were also more independent
cities -- so Pergamon, for example, had its own area,
and we'll look at Pergamon in just a second. So, art
the Hellenistic period is quite unique for its drama,
its emotion, its interest in violence, and the extremes of human existence.
So, it's usually considered quite an appealing style
at because it explores these areas of human experience and emotion.
The Hellenistic period is quite complex politically because
the Empire is broken up into these different areas, and it's also considered
a very important period economically because areas like Egypt were really thriving
during this time, so it's an important period in multiple facets of history.
In terms of artwork this style is quite exciting and unique.
So focusing in here, we are looking at work that is again a Roman copy -- it's a
floor mosaic from the city of Pompeii, which is preserved
through the volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE [or AD].
And so luckily it preserved
this floor mosaic, which we believe originally was a Hellenistic painting
that commemorates the Battle of Issus, which was a battle that Alexander
was involved in against Darius III, who's over here, so
easy to you lose Alexander here because it is a very damaged area,
but this is Alexander on the side. This is Darius III over on
this side. We think that it's a Hellenistic painting
-- a Hellenistic painting was the model for this floor
mosaic
because it has a very earth-toned color scheme, so
it has these light browns, and then darker browns and yellows.
It doesn't have a very detailed background to it,
so we do think that it is based on a Hellenistic original.
Again, there's not much of a landscape, and there are areas that are missing
from the mosaic,
but it does give us a sense of the kind of drama that was incorporated
into Hellenistic works of art, so there's definitely a
crowd that's moving about here. You can see Alexander
running into battle here. He's already stabbed this individual here, but
you can see he's already looking past him onto Darius III,
and Darius III is being pushed off of the battlefield or being
carted off the battlefield in his chariot. You can see his charioteer
grabbing onto his whip and
whipping the horses, while Darius III is extending his arm,
possibly begging for mercy or hoping for Alexander to retreat.
You can see that on his side the Persian
warriors or soldiers are looking rather concerned -- its a bit chaotic --
and we would expect that Alexander's soldiers would look quite orderly on this side,
but
the general idea that they're charging into battle, whereas the Persians are
looking more chaotic.
A couple of artistic devices that are noticeable. You have a horse that's foreshortened,
so it's actually going
into the picture plane, which is quite exceptional, and then also you have
a figure that gazing into a shield and seeing his own reflection,
so a few elements that have been incorporated here.
The Battle of Issus took place right here -- just to orient you geographically.
And then here just zooming in on Darius III. You can see him here, and it's
usually easy to differentiate the Persians from
Alexander's troops. They have a specific style of hat that they're wearing or
headdress, and then they also tend to wear pants -- long
tunics and pants -- it's usually pretty easy to spot them.
And the artist that this [painting] is attributed to -- the Hellenistic original --
is Philoxenos of Eretria,
however, there have been some other suggestions, as well.
Alright, another work of Hellenistic sculpture, comes from the "Victory Monument
of Attalos I", who reigned
from 241-197 BCE, and it's to celebrate a victory over the Gauls, who
were
a people that came from the west, and we're continually harassing different
cities around the area of Pergamon. So, Pergamon is located in modern-day Turkey,
and at this this is one idea for how the victory monument would have appeared,
but the idea was that the people of Pergamon were finally able to defeat this
group of Gauls,
and so what we see here is a Gallic chieftain -- rather than being taken
captive, he's committing suicide and having already killed his wife. So, we see
her here
collapsing. We see him plunging the dagger into his chest,
and little bits of blood are coming down. Again, this is a Roman copy,
so we're not seeing the original. We can see their
ethnic difference in the fact that they have choppier hair. He's wearing a mustache or
he has moustache, so there are clear indications that anyone at Pergamon
would have been able to you recognize that these were outsiders.
Another figure on the Victory Monument would have been the "Dying Gaul", so we see
him here
laying down. He also has a wound. You can see blood coming from
this wound on the side. He's wearing a torque or a kind of rope necklace.
He has that same choppy hair and mustache, so we know that he's an outsider.
He's not a person from Pergamon. He's a a Gallic
warrior. He has his trumpet here, and also he's on his shield,
so we know he's at this point of decline, that he's dying,
and this should bring to mind those dying warriors from the pediments of
the Temple of Aphaia at Aegina -- those figures that were collapsing, the life was draining
from them,
but here we see in the Hellenistic period an even more naturalistic
figure -- more detail to muscles and veins and
and more naturalistic proportions, and if we zoomed in here even closer, you
could see that he had deeply undercut eyebrows,
so that adds to the emotion of his appearance.
Another work from Pergamon is the "Great Altar of Zeus",
which was a large structure -- most if it has now been taken to Germany
and is now a museum called the Pergamon Museum. Inside the upper part recounts
the founding of the city, and down below is a battle between
the gods and the giants. So, it was built by successor of Attalos I.
So Attalos remember wanted to commemorate his victory over the Gauls [with the moument we just saw].
Eumenes II created this large altar as a way of
honoring Zeus. And just as a side note: Pergamon was eventually bequeathed to Rome in
133 BCE
So remember that Rome is becoming a very powerful city
and empire at this point. So if we zoom in on a key scene
we see Athena battling Alkyoneos.
So this is a scene between the gods -- Athena -- and the giants. So these
are giant figures here.
These are snaky, earthly beings and so Athena is defeating Aklyoneos by
ripping him from the earth, so his mother Ge down here
is trying to save him. You can see her looking up at Athena and appealing to
her,
but to no avail. Athena is ripping him from the earth,
and you can see he's snaky legs, and snaky forms coming out from him,
and you can see his deeply undercut eyes showing his concern
and Athena is going to kill him, and we know that she's going to be victorious
because she's being crowned victorious by the figure of Nike here.
Unfortunately a lot of the faces are damaged but Nike would have had a
head, and Athena
would have had a face, but unfortunately those
are now missing. And the figure of Athena here is reminiscent
of the figure of Athena on the pediment at the Parthenon. So
both the Dying Gaul and the figure here
are reminiscent of certain examples from the Archaic and Classical periods,
indicating that there's definitely still a respect for these periods, as we move
into the Hellenistic time.
And a final Hellenistic work -- probably one of the most famous -- currently in the
Vatican
is the "Laocoon", and this is a work of art that
is believed to be by three sculptors of Rhodes. There were stories about this work --
stories that it was crafted out of a single piece of marble,
but in fact it's probably made of multiple works or multiple
pieces.
When this work was first discovered Michelangelo was actually
there when it came out of the earth around the year 1500
So it was a very impressive sculpture in ancient past but also
was very important in the Renaissance as well.
What we see here is the figure of Laocoon, who warned the Trojans about
accepting the Trojan horse -- or accepting the wooden horse
that was a so-called gift of the Greeks,
but at that point the gods had already decided that the Greeks are going to win,
so a snake was sent and he was killed, so we see this moment of a snake
about to bite into his hip. We see him writhing in
pain and concern. His body is muscled and
youthful, but his face tends to show his age. We have those deeply
undercut eyebrows as well. We see one of his
sons trying to escape, and one that's about killed.
All three figures are joined together by this snake,
and all of them are writhing in pain and
definitely showing their concern. So the story the Trojan War
remains relevant as we move along remains an important story.
And next we'll be moving on to the Etruscans.