Metopes

Herakles and the Kerkopes

Location: Temple C at Selinus (Sicily)

Date: c575-550 BC

Height: 1.5m

Story: Kerkopes stole Herakles’ weapons, Herakles caught them an suspended upside down and carried them, they were afraid of his backside

Compositional structure:

• Neat

• Used to be painted

• Herakles as clear central figure

• Many many parallel line

Features:

• Limestone - cheap but does not allow for a sharp edge

• Maximisation of available space

Figures:

• Herakles

  • Dead straight legs

  • Some attempt at anatomy - calf muscles

  • Insectoid eyes

  • Archaic smile - shows life

  • Full frontal but profile legs

  • Herakles provides a powerful line of symmetry on his face and upper torso

  • One foot forward

  • Both feet flat on the floor

• Identical Kerkopes

  • Very 2D feel

  • Minimal rounding

  • Touch of realism - shackles on ankles and wrists

  • Inappropriate archaic smile

  • Kerkopes shape mirrors each other as befits twins

  • Stupid archaic hair

Scholars:

• “The sculptor has not thought about the design in three dimensions, but rather has conceived of it as a flat pattern” - Woodford

• “dominated by emphatic verticals and horizontals” - Woodford

Perseus slays Medusa

Location: Temple C at Selinus

Date: c575-550 BC

Height: N/A

Story: We know this story by now

Compositional structure:

• Awful

• Three massive figures and a tiny horse

Features:

• Pegasus sprung from Medusa’s head

• Her head is still attached?

• No unity of scale

Figures:

• Athena

  • Disguise in mortal form

• Perseus

  • Archaic smile

  • Insectoid eyes

• Medusa

  • Terrifying

  • No snaky hair

  • Jesus

• Pegasus

  • Sprung from Medusa’s head which remains attached

Scholars:

• nothing can describe this mess

Heroic Cattle Raid

Location: Sikyonian Treasury at Delphi

Date: c575-550 BC

Height: 63cm

Story: nicking cows

Compositional structure:

• 4 men, 12 cows

• Marching

Features:

• Archaic metope

• Used to be painted red

• Limestone would crumble

• Marble

Figures:

• Repeated bobbles for the hair

• Marching

• One arm raised with jaunty spear over their shoulders

• Positions/shape of legs

• Legs beatifully in line

• Even cows follow archaic ideas

• Archaic metope

Scholars:

• “brilliant impression of receding places” - Boardman

• “repetition rather than symmetry…to give the composition decorative coherence” - Woodford

Nemean Lion

Location: Temple of Zeus at Olympia

Date: c475-450 BC

Height: N/A

Story: One of the twelve labours Herakles was required to undertake set but Eurystheus, King of Mycanae

Compositional structure:

• Herakles stood with his foot on the corpse of the Nemean lion, flanked by Athena and Hermes

Features:

• Is not showing the actual fight

Figures:

• Athena

  • Relatively young

  • Offering sympathy

• Herakles

  • Exhausted

  • Young

  • No beard

  • “he’s absolutely cream-crackered”

  • Adopts the pose of a triumphant hunter

• Nemean Lion

  • Provides depth

  • Very dead

• Hermes

  • Was there in the story, probably where the gap was

  • Wide-brimmed hat

Scholars:

• “as human, suffering, exhausted, humiliated, and yet bravely enduring” - Woodford

• “beyond the confines of mortality” - Woodford

• “revolutionary” - Woodford

Cleaning the Augean Stables

Location: Temple of Zeus at Olympia

Date: c475-450 BC

Height: N/A

Story: One of the twelve labours Herakles was required to undertake set but Eurystheus, King of Mycanae - had to clean out the Augean Stables

Compositional structure:

• Herakles takes up most of the left side as Athena directs him from the right

Features:

• Represents the triumph of civilisation over barbarism

• Local myth

• Spear and shovel parallel - Athena using it as a pointer

• Using Athena’s brain rather than Herakles’ brawn

Figures:

• Herakles

  • Strong diagonal - chiastic composition

  • More mature Herakles - bearded

• Athena

  • Catenary folds

  • Plain austerity of Athena’s peplos

  • Calm vertical figure provides an edge to the figure

  • Bent leg pressing against the folds

  • Pointing with a spear

Scholars:

• Confident, in the midst of motion” - Woodford

The Cretan Bull

Location: Temple of Zeus at Olympia

Date: c475-450 BC

Height: N/A

Story: One of the twelve labours Herakles was required to undertake set but Eurystheus, King of Mycanae

Compositional structure:

• CHIASTIC

• Herakles opposed diagonally with the Cretan Bull to fit in the square space of the metope

Features:

• Another triumph of civilisation over barbarism

• Horn made of a separate piece of stone

• Polychromy

Figures:

• Herakles

  • Herakles is clearly in front of the bull

  • Asymmetrical torso due to lifted arm

  • Chiastic

  • Tense muscles reflecting difficulty of the task

• Cretan Bull

  • Bull’s head is being pulled back

  • One very angry bull

Scholars:

• “deeply exciting…with its conflict of forces” - Andronicus

The Apples of the Hesperides

Location: Temple of Zeus at Olympia

Date: c475-450 BC

Height: N/A

Story: One of the twelve labours Herakles was required to undertake set but Eurystheus, King of Mycanae

Compositional structure:

• Three figures dividing the square

Features:

• Three powerful verticals with subtle variations in poses

Figures:

• Athena

  • Heavy peplos

  • Legs rigidly straight

  • Deep, sparse folds

  • Defining spear

  • Weight on her left leg

  • Effortlessly helping Herakles

  • Essentially standing full-frontal other than her head

• Herakles

  • Head bowed due to his effort

  • Enforced stillness of Herakles - labours to hold up the sky

  • Holding up the sky

  • Getting used to these labours

  • Beard

  • Cushion between the sky and his back

  • Entirely in profile

• Atlas

  • Holding out the apples cautiously

  • Apples made of bronze and rolled away

  • Relaxed - weight on his left leg

  • Right leg relaxed and bent

  • Asymmetric hips, three-quarter torso

Scholars:

• Atlas holding out the apples “with cautious admiration” - Osborne

• “Athene is supportive, yet distant, and her support costs no effort” - Osborne

• “Herakles…trapped between the weight of heaven as he tenses his muscles and forces back his shoulders to maintain the balance” - Osborne

South: Centaurs and Lapiths

Location: Metopes of the Parthenon

Date: 447-442 BC

Height: N/A

Story: Centauromachy

Compositional structure:

• Centaur is holding the lapith in a headlock

Features:

• Would have been painted

Figures:

• Centaur

  • Rock in his right hand

  • Veins

  • Rears up

  • Where is his tail?

  • Convincing centaur legs and hooves

  • Holding the lapith in a headlock

• Lapith

  • Attempting to stab the centaur with a spit

  • Doubled over torso

  • Depth through cloak over shoulder

  • Interlocking limbs

Scholars:

• “their poses have been carefully arranged to fill the entire space” - Woodford

• “figures appear to move freely, engrossed in their combat” - Woodford

Metope XXVI

Location: Metopes of the Parthenon

Date: 447-442 BC

Height: N/A

Story: Centauromachy

Compositional structure:

• Lapith kicking a funky-looking centaur

Features:

• Paint on the cloak

• Representing civilisation against barbarity

Figures:

• Lapith

  • Lapith aimed a kick at centaur

  • Standing on the ball of his right foot

  • Overly muscular torso

  • Comparative size of human anatomy

  • Not convinced legs are the same length

  • Stone (?) in his left hand

  • Unrealistic and dramaticised

• Centaur

  • Rears up against his opponent

  • Armed would have been reused

  • Overly muscled

  • No neck

  • Bunched up towards the middle

  • Very flat face

Scholars:

• “the work of a less accomplished sculptor” - Woodford

• “awkward” - Woodford

Metope XXVII

Location: Metopes of the Parthenon

Date: 447-442 BC

Height: N/A

Story: Centauromachy

Compositional structure:

• Chiastic composition

Features:

• Contrast of light and dark - chiaroscuro

• Centaur and lapith pull away from each other

• Impressive utilisation of the space

Figures:

• Centaur

  • Impressive anatomy

• Lapith

  • Deep folds provide stunning backdrop

  • Catenary folds

Scholars:

• “telling description of rippling muscles and tensed bodies” - Woodford

Metope XXVIII

Location: Metopes of the Parthenon

Date: 447-442 BC

Height: N/A

Story: Centauromachy

Compositional structure:

• Nothing to balance the centaur out

Features:

• Animal skin - balanced by human torso

• Dead guy

Figures:

• Dead guy

• Centaur

  • Clobbering a guy with a pot

  • Traces of a wine jar

Scholars:

• “Another outstanding metope” - Woodford

• “sensitively rendered body crumbled pathetically in death” - Woodford