ARTH 4748

In Search of the Ancient Artist

Course Description

Course information provided by the Courses of Study 2015-2016.

Classical literature has bequeathed us the names of many celebrated Greek artists, from Pheidias, who made the colossal statue of Olympian Zeus, to Apelles, the court painter of Alexander the Great. Strikingly, very few works by these "Old Masters" survive in the archaeological record. This course tackles the problems that arise from the gap that exists between famous artists known to us from the ancient textual tradition and the mass of objects that survive by lesser known, often anonymous makers. How useful is literary evidence for traditional art historical practices of attribution and connoisseurship, in the case of antiquity? Is it appropriate to apply the concept of the "artist" (rather than "craftsman") to ancient material culture? What evidence is there for actual artistic production in the Greek and Roman world, and what can this tell us about ancient artists? Covering the period from Archaic Greece until the early Roman Empire, we will explore the role, status, agency, and identity of the ancient artist across a variety of media, including vase-painting, metal work, marble and bronze sculpture, and engraved gems.

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