Art History Pre-1400 Midterm

Neo-Sumerian Art

-2150-1600 BCE -"New" or "revived" Sumerian Art -Used traditional techniques of earlier Sumerian Art (early revival style in art history)

Babylonian Art

-2150-1600 BCE -One of their most powerful leaders was Hammurabi, a king who conquered most of Mesopotamia and ruled Babylon at its height of power. He outlined a series of 282 laws that became known as Hammurabi's Code, which included the familiar adage ''an eye for an eye.''

Akkadian Art

-2332-2150 BCE -In 2332 BCE, the loosely linked group of cities known as Sumer came under the domination of a great ruler, Sargon of Akkad. -Art was created to highlight the rulers. The Akkadian kings wanted art to remind the conquered people how impressive and important the kings were, so they wouldn't try to revolt.

Cycladic Art

-2800-1900 BCE -Name derives from Cyclades islands in Aegean Sea: Naxos, Paros, Melos, Thera -Culture contemporary with Sumerians in Mesopotamia -Had no written records. -Works of art: marble statues of human figure

Aegean Art

-Aegean Civilization 2800-1200 BCE -Cycladic culture -Minoan culture -Mycenaean culture -These cultures were forerunners of Ancient Greek civilization

Late Classical Greek Art Pieces

-Aphrodite of Knidos, Praxiteles's marble Greek original for Temple of Aphrodite: female nude figure statue

Prehistoric Art

-Before history = before written records -BCE: Before the Common Era

Late Babylonian Art Pieces

-Ishtar Gate, Babylon, Iraq: gates for royal palace that has an arch and crenellations

Archaic Greek Art Pieces

-Kroisos (the Anavysos Kouros): free standing kouros nude male sculpture in the round with archaic smile -Kore: clothed kore female statue made of marble -Temple of Aphaia: archaic greek temple -West pedimental sculpture from Temple of Aphaia; Dying Warrior: Greek warrior nude sculpture with archaic smile from Battle of Troy from Homer's Iliad -East pedimental sculpture from Temple of Aphaia; Dying Warrior: enemy Gaul warrior in nude -Exekias, Achilles and Ajax playing dice: black-figured amphora archaic vase

New Kingdom Egyptian Art Pieces

-Morturary Temple of Hatshepsut, Deir el-Bahri: temple built in a mountain which has an axial or longitudinal plan -Kneeling Figure of "King" Hatshepsut: sculpture in the round -Temple of Amen-Ra, Karnak: temple which had multiple pylons -Hypostyle Hall, Temple of Amen-Ra

Persian Art Pieces

-Palace of Darius and Xerxes, Perseplois: Persian palace -Audience Hall (apadana) of Darius and Xerxes -Bull capital from Audience Hall -Darius and Xerxes Giving Audience: low relief sculpture -Persians and Medes, Processional frieze: low relief frieze -Achaemenid rhyton: gold decorative arts object used for drinking

Old Kingdom Egyptian Art Pieces

-Palette of King Narmer: ceremonial slate used for royal makeup of Narmer the King of Upper and Lower Egypt -Imhotep, Step Pyramid and Mortuary Precinct of King Djoser, Saqqara: funerary pyramid with mastabas -Portrait of Imhotep: sculpture in the round of the architect to King Djoser -Facade of the North Palace, Mortuary Precinct of King Djoser, Saqqara: papyrus-shaped engaged columns -Pyramids of the kings Menkaure, Khafre, and Khufu, Gizeh -Great Sphinx of King Khafre: funerary and spiritual protector monument -King Khafre, Khafre's Valley Temple, Gizeh: sculpture in the round -Menkaure and His Queen, Menkaure's Valley Temple, Gizeh: sculpture -Seated Scribe, Saqqara: painted sculpture of an everyday worker -Ti Watching a Hippopotamus Hunt, mastabas tomb of Ti, Saqqara: painted limestone funerary relief

Sculptures of the Parthenon

-Phidias—chief overseer and designer -Phidian style = Classical style -Three original locations of sculpture: (1) east and west pediments (2) metopes (3) inner frieze -Stylistic features: variety, grandeur, ideal bodily proportions, natural poses, anatomical accuracy, fluid movement, complex flowing draperies, mood of serenity

Neo-Sumerian Art Pieces

-Seated Statue of Gudea holding Temple plan and Head of Gudea: sculpture in the round

Classical Greek Art

-Start of classical greek era: in 480 BCE Persian invaders sacked Athens which created the Delian League: alliance of Greek city-states, led by Athens, in successful military campaigns against Persia. Was a defining moment for forging of Hellenic (Greek) identity, reflected in architecture and decoration of buildings in Athens which had been destroyed by the Persians. -Periclean (Golden Age) of Athens: Leadership of Athenian general, Pericles. Rebuilding of temples on Acropolis of Athens such as the Parthenon. Architecture: major form was temples; function was religious, to house cult statue; location were high places, the acropolis was the highest fortified part of the ancient Greek city; plan was rectangular ground plan, raised on a platform, with columned front and back porch, and a continuous exterior colonnade (peristyle) in grandest temples; design was ideal balance of parts and the whole though geometric proportions, invention and use of the Classical Orders, decorated with sculpture on pediments, metopes and frieze.

Babylonian Art Pieces

-Stele of Hammurabi: stele with an inscription of the code of Hammurabi (first set of laws)

Neolithic Art (New Stone Age) Pieces

-Stonehenge, England: stone monument/shrine -Catal Hoyuk, Turkey: wooden town -Deer Hunt, Shrine in Catal Hoyuk: shrine in a home -View of Town and Volcano, Catal Hoyuk: landscape painting mural in a shrine in a town -Woman: maternal female nude sculpture in the round made of marble

Ziggurat

In ancient Mesopotamian architecture, a tiered platform for a temple.

In Situ (in place)

In the original place.

Optical Representation

Representation of people and objects seen from a fixed viewpoint (profile, frontal, three-quarter view, bird's eye).

Post and Lintel Construction

a horizontal beam (lintel) supported by a post at either end with large space between them

Sunken Relief

low relief sculpture that are set in a sunken area so it never rises beyond the original background surface

Paleolithic Art (Old Stone Age) Pieces

- Nude Woman (Venus of Wilendorf): maternal female nude sculpture in the round. -Woman Holding a Bison Horn: maternal female nude relief sculpture -Horses, Chauvet Cave, France: wall painting -Hall of the Bulls, Lascaux Cave, France: wall painting -Rhino, Wounded Man, and Bison, Lascaux Cave: wall painting, visual narrative -Spotted Horses and Human Hands, Pech-Merle Cave, France: wall painting

Paleolithic Art (Old Stone Age)

- Old Stone Age (40,000-9,000 BCE) -Type of Art: sculpture in the round, relief sculpture, wall painting -Subject Matter: human figure, animals -Themes: fertility -Function: magic, ritual -Women in Paleolithic Age: ideal woman was the center of life; fertility; face was ideal look of woman when they reproduced (children). -Cave Paintings of Paleolithic Age: common in southwest France; paintings and carvings in pitched black areas; art all over the caves, animal art; the story being told never stops at one artist, continues on from generations; artists used pigments to represent who created what piece.

Egyptian Art (New Kingdom)

-1550-1070 BCE -Following collapse of Middle Kingdom, restoration of unified nation overseeing imperialistic expansion and increased wealth -Rise of an all powerful caste of priests -Creation of cult of the sun-god, Amen-Re, with his capital at ancient Thebes -Architecture: huge royal mortuary temples, and great temple complexes to the gods; ground plans were axial and symmetrical, processional routes -Sculpture: along with traditional materials, use of precious materials

Mycenaean Art

-1600-1100 BCE -Contemporary with New Kingdom in Egypt -Name derives from citadel of Mycenae in southern mainland of Greece, capital of King Agamemnon, Greek hero and commander of the Greeks in the Trojan War, as recounted in Homer's Iliad -Architecture: palace citadels on coastal heights, built of huge stone blocks, use of corbel arch -Sculpture: stone guardian figures and gold death masks

Minoan Art

-2000-1450 BCE -Name derives from King Minos, character in Greek myth of the minotaur, hybrid creature contained in a labyrinth -Location: island of Crete -Written records: Linear B (early form of Greek) -Economy: farming, herding, fishing, trade -Architecture: secular palace complexes, most famous at Knossos, noted for its sophisticated engineering and human scale -Painting: wall paintings in fresco, painted ceramics -Themes: marine and animal life, landscape, islanders, decorative motifs -Style: dynamic forms, vivid colors, observation of nature, preference for curving rhythms, and geometric patterns

Egyptian Art (Old Kingdom)

-2575-2134 BCE -During the time of unification of Upper and Lower Egypt (3000 BCE) -Ancient division of Egyptian history into dynasties of kings/pharaohs vs. -Modern division into 3 kingdoms: Old, Middle and New - Architecture: monumental stone tombs (mastabas and pyramids) -Sculptures and Paintings: subjects are historic narratives, portraits of kings (pharaohs) and the elite, scenes of everyday life; stylistic features are fixed canon of proportions, order, stasis, symmetry, cubic forms, composite view of body, use of hieratic scale, idealized portrayals -Function: commemorative, funerary, ensure afterlife of the "ka" (the immortal human life force).

Hellenistic Greek Art

-323-330 BCE -"Hellenistic"—term applied to the two centuries from the death of Alexander the Great (323 BCE) to the Roman conquest of Greece and Egypt. During this period, Hellenic civilization spread beyond borders of Greece to lands conquered by Alexander. Break-up of Alexander's empire into territorial monarchies, such as Pergamon.

Sumerian Art

-3500-2332 BCE -Showed relationships between people and gods, as well as plants and animals -Architecture: religious purposes, high elevation that showed closeness of people to God -Sculptures and Statues: large round hollow eyes, broad shoulders, cylindrical bodies and limbs (symmetrically arranged), patterned shapes for beards and hair, use of hieratic scale

Late Classical Greek Art

-400-323 BCE -Historical context: towards end of Fifth Century BCE, 30 years of warfare between Athens and rival Greek city-states, the Peloponnesian Wars, ends in defeat of Athens to Sparta in 404 BCE. Rise to power of Alexander the Great, King of Macedonia, who creates a vast empire. Note that Alexander was educated in Athens by the Greek philosopher Aristotle. -New subject matter: female nude -Ideal of beauty: gracefulness and softened appearance

Persian Art

-559-330 BCE -Persian empire (modern Iran): vast geographic area from Africa to India - Founding ruler gave his name to culture: Achaemenid -Architecture: palace complexes -Sculpture: narrative reliefs, architectural sculpture -Stylistic Features of Persian Reliefs: profile and composite views of figures, slim and tall figure proportions, measured rhythms, ordered compositions, repetition of figures, patterned detailing of clothing, hair, beards (assimilation and adaptation of ideas and motifs from earlier Mesopotamian and foreign cultures). -Decorative Arts: luxury objects -Themes: rulers, peoples and prosperity of empire, animals

Late Babylonian Art (Neo-Babylonian)

-612-539 BCE -Reign of Nebuchadnezzar II -Architecture: royal palace of Babylon -Sculpture: reliefs in glazed brick; themes are guardian figures; style is symmetry, repetition, stacking, profile view, schematized; function is to glorify gods

Archaic Greek Art

-650-480 BCE -Major categories: life-size, free-standing sculpture, for display out-of-doors -Architectural sculpture: placement on temple are roofline, pediment, frieze; sculptor's challenge are telling a story within the physical constraints of the architecture; variety of techniques are low relief, high relief, sculptures in the round; allegorical mode are legendary or mythological story depicted alludes to contemporary events or a general idea -Vase painting -Monumental stone temples -Borrowed concepts and ways from the Egyptians

Assyrian Art (Later Mesopotamian Art)

-900-612 BCE -God (Ashur) and city-state (Assur) in northern Mesopotamia were praised. -Empire dominating region from 10th-7th centuries BCE -Architecture: royal palaces and citadels -Sculpture: narrative reliefs; themes are the ruler, guardian figures, lion hunts, battles; style is use of formulae but also naturalistic denial, spatial depth, dynamism -Functions of Assyrian art: glorify ruler and empire, protect ruler and subjects, decorate palaces

Amarna Style (Egyptian New Kingdom) Art Pieces

-Akhenaton, Nefertiti and Children: sunken relief sculpture of royal Egyptian family -Akhenaton, Karnak: androgynous portrait of Akhenaton -Queen Tiye: head scultpure of Akhenaton's mother made out of various precious materials -Thutmose, Queen Nefertiti: painted head scultpure -Death mask of Tutankhamen: golden mask -Innermost Coffin of Tutankhamen: golden funerary coffin

Kore

-Archaic Greek statue of a young woman, standing and clothed in long loose robes. -Subject: draped young women -Form: same as kouros, except clothed and not walking -Function: same as kouros -Interpretation: goddesses, priestesses

Hellenistic Greek Art Pieces

-Battle of Issus or Battle of Alexander and the Persians, roman mosaic after original Hellenistic painting: used tesserae, modeled with light and shading and use of foreshortening and cast shadows -Theater at Epidaurous: Hellenistic semi-circular greek theater, civic or public architecture -Acropolis of Pergamon, Turkey -Epigonos of Pergamon or Dying Gaul, likely a Roman marble copy of a Hellenistic bronze original, from Victory Monument celebrating defeat over the Gauls: enemy Gaul sculpture -West front of Great Altar of Zeus at Pergamon: altar and victory monument depicting the battle of gods and giants -Athena battling Alkyoneos, from east side of Great Frieze of the Great Altar of Zeus at Pergamon: frieze -Nike of Samothrace: victory monument meant to be seen from the right side -Seated Boxer: bronze male sculpture sitting down -Athanadoros, Hagesandros, and Polydoros of Rhodes, Laocoőn and his sons: marble statue

Mycenaean Art Pieces

-Citadel at Mycenae, Greece: citadel of Mycenaean culture -Mask of Agamemnon, royal tombs of Mycenae: mask of gold created by repoussé -Lion Gate, Mycenae: corbel arch gateway

Assyrian Art Pieces

-Citadel of Sargon II, Khorsabad, Iraq: citadel -Lamassu, Citadel of Sargon II: citadel gate high relief guardian figure sculpture -Lion Hunt, Palace of Ashurbanipal, Nineveh: gypsum low relief sculpture

Classical Orders

-Doric Order: The Doric order is characterized by, among other features, capitals with funnel-shaped echinuses, columns without bases, and a frieze of triglyphs and metopes. -Ionic Order: The Ionic order is characterized by, among other features, volutes, capitals, columns with bases, and an uninterrupted frieze.

Roman Republican Art

-Establishment of fundamental Roman institutions and ideals -Representative government with executive, legislative and judicial branches -Roman ideals: Piety, Patriotism, Pragmatism, "Gravitas"

Ancient Near Eastern Art

-Fertile Crescent: lands from the Persian Gulf through Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel and northern Egypt -The rise of cities -Invention of writing in Mesopotamia—3,000 BCE (cuneiform - for record keeping, of past as well as present; administration) -Invention of wheel -Earliest Civilizations: Mesopotamia and Egypt

Cycladic Art Pieces

-Figure of a Woman: nude female statue with geometric forms

Kouros

-Free-standing ancient Greek sculptures that represent the nude male youth. -Subject: nude youths -Form: carved in round, standing, arrested walk, closed silhouette, symmetrical, frontal, formulaic proportions, smiling, originally painted -Function: grave monuments, votive offerings -Interpretation: portraits; heroes, gods; embodiment of ideal physical beauty; cult of male body

Greek Art

-Geographical context: mainland Greece settled by Dorians, jagged coast, mountainous interior; Aegean islands and Asia Minor, settled by Ionians (origin of architectural terms: Doric and Ionic) Political context: independent city-states: Athens, Thebes, Sparta, etc.; loyalty to the "polis"; democracy: elected assembly of adult male citizens -Hellenic (Greek) Culture: shared common language, common religion and mythology, and pan-hellenic festivals: Olympic Games -Greek mythology: stories about the gods, goddesses and heroes explaining nature; gods are given human character and heroes possess superhuman powers -Seminal achievements in science, philosophy, history, literature and art underlying Western Civilization -Greek Art stylistic phases: (1) Archaic Greek Art (2) Classical (3) Late Classical (4) Hellenistic -Concept of change, innovation and development -Major works: stone sculpture in the round, vase painting, monumental stone temples decorated with architectural sculpture -Themes: human figure, gods, goddesses and heroes of myths Formal qualities: synthesis of idealism and naturalism -In Mesopotamia, nudity really meant the naked which was used to shame the defeated; in Greece, nudity expressed the ideal male figure and perfect fit

Akkadian Art Pieces

-Head of an Akkadian Ruler, Nineveh (Iraq): copper statue head in the round made through lost-wax process -Stele of Naram-Sin: low relief sculpture made of sandstone

Roman Art

-Historical Context: 8th century legendary Founding of Rome by Latin tribes after Etruscans kings expelled, Rome becomes a Republic. Romans take control over Greece, Pergamon in Asia Minor, Gaul and Egypt. Assassination of Julius Caesar and there becomes and civil war, civil war ending in the Battle of Actium. Imperial period begins with crowning of first emperor Augustus. -Assimilation and Adaptation: of native Etruscan culture and of Hellenic Culture (classical orders and collecting and copying of Greek works) -Innovation: emphasis on veristic portraiture; technical and engineering innovations such as arch and vault, use of concrete, variety of building types, manipulation of space. -Creation of Greco-Roman culture

Classical Greek Art Pieces

-Kritios Boy: nude kouros figure standing in contrapposto -Zeus or Poseidon: bronze male nude statue made of hollow-casting with lost-wax method, human figure in action -Diskobolos or Discus Thrower, Myron's bronze original: male nude statue, human figure in action -Doryphoros or Spear Bearer, Polykleitos original bronze: nude male in contrapposto leaning on wooden stump, Polykleitos's ideal canon of proportions -Iktinos and Kallikrates, The Parthenon, Acropolis, Athens: Classical Greek temple for the goddess Athena, west end had the treasury of Delian league, east end had front porch and opening to cella -Cult Statue of Athena Parthenon by Phidias: golden cult statue placed in the cella of the Parthenon -East Pediment of the Parthenon -Three goddesses, from East Pediment of the Parthenon: clothed female sculptures -God Dionysos, from East Pediment of the Parthenon: nude male sculpture -Lapith and Centaur, metopes from the south side of the Parthenon: sculptured metopes -Ionic west frieze of the Parthenon with Procession of Horsemen in the Panathenaic Festival Procession: low relief frieze -East Frieze of the Parthenon: low relief frieze of people carrying goods and the gods viewing and approving

Mesopotamian Art

-Mesopotamia= land between the rivers (Tigris and Euphrates rivers) -Independent city-states: Sumer, Akkad, Babylon -Art in service of organized religion and in service of rulers -Architecture: ziggurats, mud-brick temples, palaces and citadels -Sculpture: metal and stone portraits, relief sculpture, glazed brick reliefs -Subjects: gods, rulers, guardian figures, battles, hunts, banquets, processions

Neolithic Art (New Stone Age)

-New Stone Age (8,000-2,300 BCE) -Development of domestic and public... (1) Architecture: monuments, houses, towns, shrines; made out of stone, mud brick, wood (2) Wall Paintings: subject matter is animals, human figures; themes are hunting, fertility, environment; function is practical, naturalistic, ritualistic, funerary -Mud bricks houses that contained shrines inside that were continued over time.

Minoan Art Pieces

-Palace at Knossos, Crete: Minoan civilization palace -Wall painting in "Queen's Megaron", palace of Knossos: ocean fresco -Bull-leaping, wall painting from Knossos: bull fresco -Octopus Vase: Minoan ceramics created from potter at the wheel

Amarna Style and Akhenaton

-Rule of {Pharaoh Akhenaten) and Queen Nefertiti from the new capital at Amarna, 1390-1352 BCE -Radical and brief religious and political reform (break in tradition, going against priests) -Establishment of monotheism (belief in one god) -Amarna Style; break with tradition, innovative imagery and forms in royal portraiture

Illisionistic Devices

-The representation of the three dimensional world on a two-dimensional surface in a manner that creates the illusion that the person, object, or place represented is three-dimensional. -Introduced into Greek painting in 5th century BCE: (1) shading (2) foreshortening (3) cast shadows (4) reflections

Sumerian Art Pieces

-White Temple at Uruk, Warka, Iraq: ziggurat temple -Female Head from Temple at Uruk: head sculpture cult image made of marble -Statues from the Abu Temple, Tell Asmar, Iraq: votive statues -Royal Standard of Ur- War & Peace: front and back royalty object made of wood, lapis lazuli, shell. and red limestone

Lost-Wax Process

A bronze-casting method in which a figure is modeled in wax and covered with clay; the whole is fired, melting away the wax and hardening the clay, which then becomes a mold for molten metal. Also called the cire perdue process.

Stele

A carved stone slab used to mark graves or to commemorate historical events.

Arch

A curved structural member that spans an opening and is generally composed of wedge-shaped blocks (voussoirs) that transmit the downward pressure laterally.

Hypostyle Hall

A hall with a roof supported by columns. Hall with multiple colossal columns that held up the roof; columns sometimes spaced very close to each other.

Megaliths

A large, roughly hewn stone used in the construction of monumental prehistoric structures.

Radiocarbon Dating

A method of measuring the decay rate of carbon isotopes in organic matter to determine the age of organic materials such as wood and fiber.

Landscape Painting

A picture showing natural scenery, without narrative content.

Portico

A roofed colonnade; also an entrance porch. Porch with supporting colonnade (row of columns); supports the porch and allows light or air to pass through mortuary temple; lets multiple people walk in or out.

Canon of Proportions

A rule of proportions. The ancient Egyptians believed height and width have a definite geometrical relation to one another and so they had a linear measurement in figures. The ancient Greeks considered beauty to be a matter of "correct" proportion and sought a canon of proportion, for the human figure and for buildings. The fifth-century BCE sculptor Polykleitos wrote the Canon, a treatise incorporating his formula for the perfectly proportioned statue.

Colonnade

A series or row of columns, usually spanned by lintels.

Column

A vertical, weight-carrying (support) architectural member, circular in cross-section and consisting of a base (sometimes omitted), a shaft, and a capital.

Crenellations

Alternating solid merlons and open crenels in the notched tops of walls, as in battlements.

Mastabas

An ancient Egyptian rectangular brick or stone structure with sloping sides erected over a subterranean funerary tomb chamber connected with the outside by a shaft.

Corbel Arch

An arch formed by the piling of stone blocks in horizontal courses, cantilevered inward until the blocks meet at a keystone. Stones layered to the center apex of the arch; allows stability even with tall height.

Lamassu

Assyrian guardian in the form of a man-headed winged bull or lion.

Twisted Perspective/Composite View

Combines two or more viewpoints. Convention of representation in which part of a figure is shown in profile and another part of the same figure is shown frontally (profile gives what figure would look like).

Repoussé

Formed in relief by beating a metal plate from the back ("wrong side"), leaving the impression on the face. The metal sheet is hammered into a hollow mold of wood or some other pliable material and finished with a graver.

Guardian Figure

In art, the subject is a powerful religious, often mythological, figure that is suppose to guard the place at which it was made for

Peristyle

In classical architecture, a colonnade all around the cella and its porch(es). A peripteral colonnade consists of a single row of columns on all sides; a dipteral colonnade has a double row all around. Surrounding colonnade.

Pediment

In classical architecture, the triangular space (gable) at the end of a building, formed by the ends of the sloping roof above the colonnade; also, an ornamental feature having this shape. The triangular upper part of the front of a building in classical style, typically surmounting a portico of columns.

Hieratic Scale

Making pieces of art in different sizes to represent rank of importance or significance.

Flowstone Dating

Measuring the ages of flowstone which are horizontal deposits of calcium carbonate that form natural cements on cave floors by applying uranium-lead dating.

Votive Statue

Object made as an offering to the god(s), either to appeal for some favor, or in thanks for the same.

Fresco

Painting on lime plaster, either dry (dry fresco, or fresco secco) or wet (true, or buon, fresco). In the latter method, the pigments are mixed with water and become chemically bound to the freshly laid lime plaster. Also, a painting executed in either method.

Foreshortening

Portray or show (an object or view) as closer than it is or as having less depth or distance, as an effect of perspective or the angle of vision. The use of perspective to represent in art the apparent visual contraction of an object that extends back in space at an angle to the perpendicular plane of sight.

Hollow-Casting with Lost-Wax Method

Process by which a duplicate metal sculpture is cast from an original sculpture.

Cult Image

Sculpted or painted image representing a god or holy person; had focus on devotion or worship for a particular religious group.

Relief

Sculpture that is freed from the background to show it is raised above it. In sculpture, figures projecting from a background of which they are part. The degree of relief is designated high, low, or sunken. In the last, the artist cuts the design into the surface so that the highest projecting parts of the image are no higher than the surface itself.

Tessera (pl. tesserae)

Small piece of colored stone, marble or glass cut to the desired shape and size used in a mosaic

Visual Narrative

Story told behind certain images and paintings.

Black-Figured Technique

Style of painting in which pictures or figures were made in all black color. In early Greek pottery, the silhouetting of dark figures against a light background of natural, reddish clay, with linear details incised through the silhouettes.

Mosaic

Technique for wall, ceiling and floor decorations with designs, patterns or pictures made from tesserae (small pieces of colored stone, marble, or glass).

Cella of Temple

The chamber at the center of an ancient temple; in a classical temple, the room (Greek, naos) in which the cult statue usually stood.

Clerestory

The fenestrated part of a building that rises above the roofs of the other parts. The oldest known clerestories are Egyptian.

Axial/Longitudinal Plan

The horizontal arrangement of the parts of a building or of the buildings and streets of a city or town, or a drawing or diagram showing such an arrangement. Parts of a building are organized longitudinally, or along a given axis

Phidian Style

The image of idealism. Being calm, peaceful, and showing a perfect, relaxed human body. Phidias is said to have taken his idea of human perfection and the idea of the gods from the description of Homer. Phidias' influence over art is equivalent to Homer's over poetry (Parthenon sculptures).

Frieze

The part of the entablature between the architrave and the cornice; also, any sculptured or painted band. A broad horizontal band of sculpted or painted decoration, especially on a wall near the ceiling.

Archaic Smile

The smile that appears on all Archaic Greek statues from about 570 to 480 BCE. The smile is the Archaic sculptor's way of indicating that the person portrayed is alive. Sculpture that has a smile to communicate life and aliveness of a sculpture.

Metopes

The square panel between the triglyphs in a Doric frieze, often sculpted in relief.

Pylon

The wide entrance gateway of an Egyptian temple, characterized by its sloping walls.

Monotheism

The worship of one all-powerful god.

Capital

Top of a column that is used for support. The uppermost member of a column, serving as a transition from the shaft to the lintel. In classical architecture, the form of the capital varies with the order.

Amphora

Two handled vase used for storing wine or oil

Contrapposto

Weight shift, so that weight rests on one leg(engaged), leading to relaxed pose (new in Kouros type formed in Classical period). The disposition of the human figure in which one part is turned in opposition to another part (usually hips and legs one way, shoulders and chest another), creating a counterpositioning of the body about its central axis. Sometimes called "weight shift" because the weight of the body tends to be thrown to one foot, creating tension on one side and relaxation on the other.

Mural

a wall painting