Ancient Civilizations IB

Equal to Grade 9

Beginnings of Western Art

• We call this period the STONE AGE because of man’s dependence on tools and weapons made of stone. They were nomadic hunters and gathers that moved from place to place. Their homes were made of mud or mammoth bones and covered with animal skins.

• • Paleolithic: (Old Stone Age) -40,000- 8,000 BCE• Mesolithic: (Middle Stone Age) - 8,000- 7,000 BCE• Neolithic: (New Stone Age) - 7,000- 2,300 BCE• ..a really long time ago

Cave Paintings• Artists use a lively application of line and

colour- stylized by simplifying and eliminating extra detail-

• profound understanding of the animal’s anatomy and movement.

• There are different ideas surrounding the creation of these images. Some people feel that they were a means of artistic expression. Others feel they may have been used in magic rituals for hunting and fertility. Or perhaps they documented hunting expeditions.

• Line- Most cave art consists of simple outlines (contours).

• Colours:The colours were made from various earth hues (red, yellow, brown, violet) and lampblack (made from soot from the lamps in the caves). The pigments were ground to a powder and applied directly with the fingers, bone, spatulas, or brushed

• The rare occurrence of the human figure ranges from the representational (realistic) to the schematic, but the majority are stick figures. Why do you think they were not more realistic like the animals?

LASCAUX CAVES-Dordogne France 15,000 BCE- discovered in 1940 by several small boys when their dog fell into a hole that led to a n underground chamber

CarvingsVENUS OF WILLENDORF (22,000 BCE)•Found near Willendorf, Austria•Carved from limestone and originally painted with red ochre•Statuette’s swelling, and rounded form, make it seem larger than its actual 4.5 inches•Suggests fertility and plentiful supply of food•The sculptor exaggerated the figures female attributes, giving her a large belly, wide hips and solid thighs. These suggest the image is a fertility symbol. Perhaps for use in a ritual dealing with childbirth.•Some scholars feel this is the representation of the ‘ideal’ Ice Age Woman, with the fat accumulation desirable to conceive and bear healthy children during periods of food shortages.•Others suggest that these figures are guardian figures or dolls•The title of ‘Venus’ was given to this statuette because Venus was the Roman goddess of love and beauty

•a

Architecture Stonehenge- (Neolithic)

(2750-1500 BCE) Salisbury, England

Humans left their caves and began to form communities. They herded cattle and raised simple crops. They lived in simple structured of grass, mud-bricks and even stone.

•Several huge stone Monoliths (a large single block of stone used in architecture or sculpture) some weighing up to 50 tons. The outer circle originally had 30 standing stones. 16 remain today.

•the Lintels (horizontal structure member that spans an opening between two walls or posts) were curved slightly to fit the circular plan.

•‘henge” meaning a circle formed by stones or wooden posts, often surrounded by a ditch with built up embankments•the stones were dragged for more than 20 miles to be trimmed and stood on end

•It is believed that Stonehenge was constructed to indicate the solstices and equinoxes of the calendar year.

EGYPTIAN ART

• Old Kingdom (2686-2150 BCE)• Middle Kingdom (2100-1700 BCE)• New Kingdom (1500-1085 BCE)

OLD KINGDOM-

THE GREAT PYRAMIDS

STEP PYRAMID OF ZOSER (Saqqara (2680 BCE)

Architect- Imhotep

-65m (20 stories)-buriel chamber 25 m below monument

THE GREAT PYRAMIDS OF GIZA (2530-2470)

-Square base 276m x 276m, 176m high (55 stories)-tallest structure in the world until the Eiffel tower was built-2 million blocks of stone-burial chamber in the heart of the pyramid-Interior walls covered by relief sculptures

The outer covering of the pyramids have been eroded off,

Note the size of the stones (some over40 tons)

Great Sphinx (guards the pyramids of Giza)

•80 m in length -Carved from a rocky ledge

•Body of a lion -Head of Chefren ( one of the Pharaohs who built one of the pyramids)

•It has beenvandalized and damaged further by the sandblasting winds of the Sahara

MIDDLE KINGDOM (2100-1700 BCE)

FUNERAL TEMPLE OF QUEEN HATSHEPSUT1480 BCE

•Built into a cliff and part was built inside

•Many terraces walls, colonnades, sculptured relief's, passageways. Large open terraces

•Queen spent most of her reign construcitn the temple.

•She would strap a falsr beard to her chin and wear men’s clothing when she visited her site.

NEW KINGDOM (1500-1085)HYPOSTLE HALL (1530 BCE)

Temple of Amun, at Karnack-135 columns, 21 metres high (7 stories)

-columns capped with open-flowered capitals- some in the shape of a lotus blossom

-covered in reliefs

lintels

Columns close together to prevent storne lintels from breaking

SCULPTURE-Old Kingdom

Mycerinus and His Queen

•Cut from a single block of slate

•Almost life size

•frontal pose-one foot out

•stylized

Realistic depiction- elongated face and hands

Note the pot belly of the sculpture

Nefertiti (1360 BCE)

•Akhenaton’s wife, a most beautiful woman

•Left abandoned in the artist’s studio

•Realistic

King Tutankhaten (King Tut)

Akhenaton's successor at the age of nine, ruled for nine years

Famous due to the riches found in his UNVANDALIZED tomb (hidden under the ruins of another tomb)

FIGURES IN ARTWORK

Heads-profile

Eye- frontal

Shoulders- frontal

Arms- both arms and legs shown- usually stretched out- profile

-two right feet

Descriptive Perspective- the most important figures were larger than the less important ones

Figures in Relief Sculpture

Greek Art

The Archaic Period: 600-480 BCEThe Classic Period: 480-323 BCE-Began after 480 BCE when the Greeks

defeated the Persian fleet at Salamis.Hellenistic Period: 323-150 BCE

aIntroduction:Greeks were interested in creating beauty and harmony with their art.Human beings were central to the Greek culture.A lot of their art focuses on the idealized human form.They gave their gods perfect human form, though they were shown to be a bit larger than real people The Greeks considered the human body beautiful, perfectly balanced and harmonious.

Group of Aphrodite, P an and Eros

ARCHAIC PERIOD-Sculpture:KOUROS, STATUE OF A YOUTH (600 BCE) (6’ 4”)

PEPLOS KORE (4’)Most Greek sculptures were painted, notwhite as we see them today

•Figure is stylized•Wearing an archaic smile (close lipped)•A youth- he is not a child but he is also not a man•Rigid, standing figure of a man (and girl) facing forward•The left foot is slightly forward, kneecaps slightly carved•Both arms are held stiffly at his side•The hair is stylized into small ringlets.•Unlike Egyptian statues the youths are freestanding, with lack of supports to hold the figure at the legs

Amor Greece Trip 2007

Contrast and Compare

CLASSICAL PERIOD-Sculpture •Over the next 75 years, sculptures became more natural and realistic representations of the human figure. They began to sculpt what they saw, rather than ideal forms.

• The Archaic smile is replaced by a look of calm and self control. The features and pose remain a bit rigid and severe

KRITIOS BOY (480 BCE) 1.17 m

(3 ft 10 ins)

•Accurate sculptured muscles and skeletal (bones) structure•This figure is able to stand on it’s own; his back leg is not bound to a block for balance

CONTROPOSTO: The position of a human figure in painting or sculpture in which the hips and legs are turned in a different direction from that of the shoulders and head; the twisting of a figure. Especially a way of sculpting a human figure in a natural pose with the weight of one leg, the shoulder, and hips counterbalancing each other. This allows the sculpture to stand on it’s own.•The body has a faint S-curve•Natural stance, the body is relaxed (at ease as opposed to attention)

THE THREE GODDESSES (435 BCE)

Found in the eastern pediment of the Parthenon (see Architecture next section).

•Marble, over life size•Drapery clings to their bodies; it is no longer stylized or severe.•Folds create visual movement.•The Parthenon is dedicated to the birth of Athena and the goddesses are looking towards a sculpture portraying this birth.•The Greek legend states that Athena burst out of her father’s head as an adult wearing full body armor.

a•a

a•a

• Ssssssss