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The Egyptians and the Athenians were two separate civilizations that lived during different times. Many of their art pieces that we find now are similar, but very different at the same time. During this essay I will be comparing and contrasting two statues that are from two different civilizations. We will see how the Athenians took many of the Egyptians techniques into their art, but we will see their unique style as well. The statue of Menkaure and a Queen was made by the Egyptians. This was made with greywacke and is 54 ½ “tall. In the double portrait we can see the power of the kingdom in the king’s stance. He is standing stiff and is getting ready to walk, he holds cylinder shaped objects in his hands that he holds very tightly. …show more content…
His muscles are prominent on his chest, arms, and legs.
With the Queen we see the beauty and the kindness of the kingdom in her. The embrace in which she is holding Menkaure shows her love and she is also walking forward because of their unity. The way that they are walking forward together shows the unity of the kingdom. Menkaure is wearing the royal kilt and headdress that all kings wore if they were the ones reigning at the time. The Queen is wearing a garment that covers her whole body but shows the natural curves of her body at the same time. In the statue of Metropolitan Kouros we are focusing only on a man instead of a pair of people. This statue was made by the Athenians, the Athenians took many of the Egyptians techniques in art later on in time. In this time period they did not have very life like statues like the Egyptians did. The Metropolitan Kouros was a statue that was free standing. Athenians had just developed the technique of making statues that could stand on their own without the original rock that they were carved from. This figure is stepping forward as if walking and is standing stiffly with his arms by his
sides. He has no clothes on and this was common for Greek people and was valued by them. His hair is like strings and is tied back with a ribbon. His body is slightly muscular, but is messed up by the lines running across certain parts of the body. These include: the stomach, the arms, and part of the legs. His ears were on the side of his head but way too far back as said in the website, http://www.metmuseum.org/toah/works-of-art/32.11.1/. I will now be comparing and contrasting these two statues, but I will not be focusing on the Queen since the Metropolitan Kouros has no girl or woman in the statue. From the earlier paragraph I mentioned that they are both stepping forward as if they were they walking. But more than that is the fact that they are both stepping forward with their left foot. Menkaure and Metropolitan Kouros are both in the same pose or stance, which is stiff and standing straight up with arms to their sides tightly. A big difference in these two statues is that the Metropolitan Kouros is not wearing any clothes while Menkaure has on a kilt and a headdress. With the Metropolitan Kouros the nakedness of his body was valued by the Greeks even though it was not common. Another very significant difference between the two statues is that the Metropolitan Kouros is a free standing statue. Whereas Menkaure is attached to the stone that he and the Queen were carved from originally. The materials that these two statues are also different. Metropolitan Kouros was made out of marble whereas Menkaure was made out of greywacke, https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=what%20is%20greywacke . Metropolitan Kouros was one of the statues that were used to mark graves and they also lined the walkway of sanctuaries all the way from the gate to the main temple. The Menkaure and a Queen statue was used for decoration inside palace complexes. These two purposes are somewhat similar because they are both used for a temple or palace except one is inside and one is outside of the temple or palace.
There are many similarities between the sculpture of the kouros and King Menkaure and His Queen. Since the Greeks used the same technique as the Egyptians, the statue of the kouros is posed stiffly with his arms straight down at his sides in the same manner that Egyptian pharaohs were often depicted. His left foot is slightly in front of the right, just as King Menkaure’s left foot is. Both figures are looking straight ahead, have their feet planted on the ground, and have long hair. The kouros represented the ideal form of a young male to the Greeks, just as the figures of King Menkaure and his queen depict the ideal notion of beauty to the Egyptians. The kouros emulates the stiff pose
The difference between an archaic statue such as Kroisos (fig. 5-11) and a classical statue such as Doryphoros (fig. 5-42) may not seem very great in a single glance. In fact, you may not notice any differences in that one glance. Yet, if you were to look at them closely, you can see that these two statues actually have very little in common.
To conclude, both sculptures do not have much in common, but it is obvious that the artists had knowledge in human anatomy and was able to sculpt them spectacularly. It is also obvious the break from somewhat idealistic to realistic human nature. The change is so drastic that one might not believe that both sculptures come from the same Greece because it is so well-known for its astonishing artworks found in temples, building, etc.
First, the portrait of Menkaure and a Queen was made in the Old Kingdom Egypt. The two figures are locked in place together in the frontal poses. They can be viewed from the front and the sides, but the back is flat and has no carved details. Although they do not stand in composite pose, their proportions are following the Egyptian canon. Thus, they have athletic bodies which are idealized from the shoulders to the waist to the hips. They were made to be the perfect symbol of human beings at that time to Egyptians’ belief. For this sculpture portray a royal family in a formal state, the two figures do not have face
The statue of Hatshepsut seated down is made with the material limestone. This limestone is lightly colored, which created a larger contrast with the other statues nearby. Her face was carved bringing out her eyes, eyebrows and other facial features. Her eyebrows also come slightly together towards the middle. Her lips forming a slight archaic smile. The dimensions are larger than an average female size. The statue is of great size, yet still in proportion. The body and head fit well with each other overall. However, it is greatly exaggerated in size.
The Statue of a kouros and the Portrait statue of a boy both depict similar subjects, however are greatly different in how they accomplish this task. Through detail, or lack there of, the Greeks and Romans are able to display a certain value they have in its members. These two statues were made about 500 years apart and approach the sculpting process quit differently. The Greek statue seems to use geometric exaggerated lines to form the body while the Romans use a more realistic approach and sculpt the body with a more rounded finish. Statue of a kouros, from about 590 B.C and Portrait of a boy, from about the first century, do not share any great technical aspects and are basically nothing alike.
In conclusion, although Mycerinus and Kha-merer-nebty II and Augustus of Primaporta, do appear very different, come from entirely different geographic regions and were separated by thousands of years, they do have many things in common. When we consider subject, style, and function; perhaps other works of art have more in common than they appear to have.
Aegean art is very simple and plain but very beautiful. Their sculpture has very little detail carved into the art but that maybe because originally their statue was painted in very bright colors. The female figures are plainer and more compact the arms and legs are folded in there no gap in between their arms and legs. While the male figures like the “male harp player from keros, c. 260—2300 B.C.E., Early Cycladic period, marble, 22.5 cm high”, are more detailed but not by much. They are more rounded they aren’t as straight and stiff looking, like the female sculpture, the male statues head is tilted back like is he is singing along to the music he plays with his harp, the leg and arm are open and apart unlike in the female sculpture who is compacted into a rectangle like shape. But they must have looked much different and more alive when they were painted than they do now. But even without the paint they still look beautiful.
This statue is the most well known sculpture, made during the transition period between the late archaic and classical period. It allows modern viewers to see the transition between the stoic Kouro and Kourai to the more sensual, defined and human-like figurines of the later periods Sculptures like Kritios Boy filled friezes in elite Roman villas and magnificent buildings like the Parenthon. It is seplucated that this statue was made between 400-480 BCE, by the artist Krito a philosopher, teacher and artist. They're many ideas relating to sculptures representation, most historians agree that it may represent the youth and virility of a victor returning from war. Due to the location the statue was found it is safe to assume that Athenians
Egyptian art is infamous across the world - classified by the monumental pyramids, and the Sphinx. Although these are both valid forms of Egyptian art, they do not make up the entire artistic history of the country. On the contrary, perhaps the most replicated example of classic Egyptian art, from the Old Kingdom, can be found in their rendering of the human form. An interest in portraiture developed early in Egypt. (Gardner, 75) Whether painted on pottery, or cut into rock, the figures all had notably Egyptian characteristics. "The seated statue is one of only a very small number of basic formulaic types employed by the sculptors of the Old Kingdom." (Gardner, 75)
- Priest of Troy being punished by the Gods for warning against accepting horse from the Greeks. Sea serpents attacked him and his sons. Beautiful anatomy.
This is a copy of the sculpture of Athena Parthenos, dressed in battle attire, that was originally created by Phidias during the period of 447-39 B.C. The statue of Athena Parthenos was to be constructed, not of bronze, but of gold and ivory. The face, arms, and feet of the statue were to be made of ivory and the clothing, of thickly plated gold. The statue was an enormous size that towered thirty-three feet tall. The costly nature of the materials out of which it was designed was intended to overwhelm the viewer, creating a sense of religious awe.
We find that, in conclusion, that these pieces are very similar in many ways. They are both originally created in the same style and time period. They are Hellenistic and dramatic, although in their own, individualistic way. Each sculpture was created in different mediums and have different stories. These are both very individualistic pieces of Greco/Roman sculpture that has influenced many artists throughout time and will
The word “ancient” can be a hard word to describe. It has no specific time period, but also does at the same time. When something is described as ancient, it is something that is extremely old, or was in the very distant past. Ancient Egyptian and Ancient Greek civilizations co-existed from 1150BC to 146BC. They had different systems, beliefs, and life styles, just like how different countries do today. There were also similarities, such as both having a single person be the ruler, not giving equal power to everyone. For Greeks, this would be a king and for Egyptians, and Pharaoh. Both Ancient Egypt and Ancient Greece believed in mythology – a similarity between the two. However, much of their mythology was different. Although both Egypt
Roman artwork is extremely intricate and diverse, however, a lot of what is referred to as Roman art can better be described by the cultures it conquered. The ancient Greeks were the most influential of these cultures, from their temples and sculptures, to their reliefs and paintings. Greece was the first culture to create major programs for sculpture, painting, and architecture. Many of the first Roman artists were of Greek descent as their artwork reflects the Classical and Hellenistic periods of ancient Greece. A lot of what is considered to be Roman artwork is criticized as being mere copies of Greek artwork since they modeled their forms and styles after the Greeks, but other cultures influenced the Romans as well, mainly the Etruscans,