6. Archaic period: painting (part 2)

red-figure vase painting

540-400 BC

• best works from 525 - 480 B.C

• technical reversal of black figure 

  • the background is painted in slip which turns black in firing, while the figures are left in the natural color of the clay

  • details are added by incising and brushwork

Panathenaic Amphora (566 BC)

• panathenaic games reorganized in 566

• eponymous archon: on of the chief magistrates after whom a given year was names

• painted inscription on Panathenaxi amphorae :ton Athenethen athlon = the athletic prizes from athens

white ground pottery

• rare in the archaic but common in the classical period

• red figure technique employed over a white glaze background

bilingual amphora by the Andokides painter (510 BC)

• Bilinggual vessel decorated in black figyre on one side and red figure on the other side

• Lysippises painter: the artist who may have painted the black figure side, but probably the same person as andokides painter

• on red figure side: herakles chaining the 3 headed dog cerberus, who guarded the way to the underworld

Calyx krater by Euphronios (515 BC) : developed red figure

• Euphronios: one of the greatest Attic painters working in the developed red- figure technique

• calyx: the bell of a flower, hence a bell-shaped krater

• herakles wrestling with the giant Antaios with nymphs fleeing on either side

• Chiastic effect: from the greek letter ch, composition emphasizing crossed diagonals like an X

Amphora by Euthymides (510 BC) : developed red figure

• foreshortening: the depiction of objects in such a way that they appear to recede into the distance

• scene of 3 dancing drinking companions on amphora by Euthymides, with inscription “as never Euphronios” (510 BC) - friendly rivalry

Berlin Krater by Euphronios (515 BC)

• Scene of athletes: foreshortened leg and foot

tondo scene Theseus and Sinus on kylix by Elpinikos painter (500 BC)

• earliest known chiastic composition involving two contesting figured

Calyx Krater by Euphronios (515 BC)

• the fallen giant Sarpedon carried from battle by twin brothers Hypnos and Thanatos

• Looking on is Hermes psychopompos (conductor of souls)

• psychopompos: the epithet of hermes as the god who guides souls of the deal to the underworld

Kylix by Sosias Painter (500 BC)

• tondo scene showing Achilles dressing the wound of his friend Patroclus

• Sosias painter: red-figure painter to whom is attibuted the first rendering of the human eye in profile

developed red-figure painters

Euphronios, Sosias painter, Kleophrades Painter, Berlin Painter

Hydria (water carrying vessel) with scenes from Sack of Troy (480 BC) by Klophrades

• pyramidal composition

• slaying of Priam by Neoptolemos, son of Achilles

• rape of Cassandra, daughter of Priam

• palladion: ancient cult statue of Athena

• rescue of Aithra by her grandsons

• escape of Trojan Aeneas from Troy with Father Achises and son Askanios

amphora by Kleophrades painter (490 BC)

• scenes of bacchic revelry involving Dionysos, maenads and satyrs

Amphora by Berlin Painter (490 BC) now in Berlin

• Berlin Painter: contemporary and rival of the Kleopharades painter

• satyr drinking from wine cup on one side of the amphora

• Hermes accompanied by satyr and fawn on the other side

Amphora by Berlin Painter (490 BC), now in Basel

• Athena in full panoply on one side

• Herakles holding wine cup on opposite side

Theseus cycles in red-figure painting after 510: adventures on road between Troizen and Athens

• Hippias, son of Peisistratos, exiles in 510, after which time democract established at Athens. so theseus becomes popular

• Painters that did it: Onesimos, Douris Kodros

• continuous narrative: the representation of the same principal figures repeatedly in some sort of continuous seeting