PATRICK JOSHUA R.

POTE SSC IX-NEWTON

Ancient Greek Art
In around 450 B.C., the Athenian general Pericles tried to consolidate his power by using public money, the dues paid to
Athens by its allies in the Delian League coalition, to support the city-state’s artists and thinkers. Most of all, Pericles paid
artisans to build temples and other public buildings in the city of Athens. He reasoned that this way he could win the
support of the Athenian people by doling out plenty of construction jobs; at the same time, by building public monuments
so grand that people would come from far and wide to see them, he could increase Athens’ prestige as well as his own.
• THE ARCHITECTURE OF CLASSICAL GREECE
The most noteworthy result of Pericles’ public-works campaign was the magnificent Parthenon, a temple in honor of the
city’s patron goddess Athena. The architects Iktinos and Kallikrates and the sculptor Pheidias began work on the temple
in the middle of the 5th century B.C. The Parthenon was built atop the Acropolis, a natural pedestal made of rock that was
the site of the earliest settlements in Athens, and Pericles invited other people to build there as well: In 437 B.C., for
example, the architect Mnesikles started to build a grand gateway known as the Propylaia at its western end, and at the
end of the century, artisans added a smaller temple for Athena—this one in honor of her role as the goddess of victory,
Athena Nike—along with one for Athena and Erechtheus, an Athenian king. Still, the Parthenon remained the site’s main
attraction.
• TEMPLE ARCHITECTURE
With its rectangular stone platform, front and back porches (the pronaos and the opisthodomos) and rows of columns,
the Parthenon was a commanding example of Greek temple architecture. Typically, the people of ancient Greece did not
worship inside their temples as we do today. Instead, the interior room (the naos or the cella) was relatively small, housing
just a statue of the deity the temple was built to honor. Worshippers gathered outside, entering only to bring offerings to
the statue.
The temples of classical Greece all shared the same general form: Rows of columns supporting a horizontal entablature (a
kind of decorative molding) and a triangular roof. At each end of the roof, above the entablature, was a triangular space
known as the pediment, into which sculptors squeezed elaborate scenes. On the Parthenon, for example, the pediment
sculptures show the birth of Athena on one end and a battle between Athena and Poseidon on the other.
So that people standing on the ground could see them, these pediment sculptures were usually painted bright colors and
were arrayed on a solid blue or red background. This paint has faded with age; as a result, the pieces of classical temples
that survive today appear to be made of white marble alone.
• PROPORTION AND PERSPECTIVE
The architects of classical Greece came up with many sophisticated techniques to make their buildings look perfectly even.
They crafted horizontal planes with a very slight upward U-shape and columns that were fatter in the middle than at the
ends. Without these innovations, the buildings would appear to sag; with them, they looked flawless and majestic.
• SCULPTURE
Not many classical statues or sculptures survive today. (Stone statues broke easily, and metal ones were often melted for
re-use.) However, we know that sculptors such as Pheidias and Polykleitos in the 5th century and Praxiteles, Skopas and
Lysippos in the 4th century had figured out how to apply the rules of anatomy and perspective to the human form just as
their counterparts applied them to buildings. Earlier statues of people had looked awkward and fake, but by the classical
period they looked natural, almost at ease. They even had realistic-looking facial expressions.
• POTTERY
Classical Greek pottery was perhaps the most utilitarian of the era’s art forms. People offered small terra cotta figurines
as gifts to gods and goddesses, buried them with the dead and gave them to their children as toys. They also used clay
pots, jars and vases for almost everything. These were painted with religious or mythological scenes that, like the era’s
statues, grew more sophisticated and realistic over time.
Much of our knowledge of classical Greek art comes from objects made of stone and clay that have survived for thousands
of years. However, we can infer that the themes we see in these works–an emphasis on pattern and order, perspective
and proportion, and man himself–appeared as well in less-durable creations such as drawings and paintings.
PATRICK JOSHUA R. POTE SSC IX-NEWTON
Ancient Egyptian Arts
Ancient Egyptian art is five thousand years old. It emerged and took shape in the ancient Egypt, the civilization of the
Nile Valley. Expressed in paintings and sculptures, it was highly symbolic and fascinating - this art form revolves round
the past and was intended to keep history alive.
In a narrow sense, Ancient Egyptian art refers to the canonical 2D and 3D art developed in Egypt from 3000 BC and used
until the 3rd century. It is to be noted that most elements of Egyptian art remained remarkably stable over the 3000
year period that represents the ancient civilization without strong outside influence. The same basic conventions and
quality of observation started at a high level and remained near that level over the period.
Ancient Egyptian art forms are characterized by regularity and detailed depiction of human beings and the nature, and,
were intended to provide company to the deceased in the 'other world'. Artists' endeavored to preserve everything of
the present time as clearly and permanently as possible. Completeness took precedence over prettiness. Some art forms
present an extraordinarily vivid representation of the time and the life, as the ancient Egyptian life was lived thousand of
years before.
Egyptian art in all forms obeyed one law: the mode of representing man, nature and the environment remained almost
the same for thousands of years and the most admired artists were those who replicated most admired styles of the
past.

Periods
• Predynastic
• Old Kingdom (2680 BC-2258 BC)
• Middle Kingdom (2134 BC-1786 BC)
• New Kingdom (1570 BC-1085 BC)
• Amarna Period (1350 BC-1320 BC)
• Ptolemaic

In Egyptian hieroglyphs, a cartouche is an oval with a horizontal line at one end, indicating that the text enclosed is a
royal name, coming into use during the beginning of the Fourth Dynasty under Pharaoh Sneferu, replacing the earlier
serekh. While the cartouche is usually vertical with a horizontal line, it is sometimes horizontal if it makes the name fit
better, with a vertical line on the left. The Ancient Egyptian word for it was shenu, and it was essentially an expanded
shen ring. In Demotic, the cartouche was reduced to a pair of parentheses and a vertical line. The word paper is derived
from "papyrus", a plant which was cultivated in the Nile delta. Papyrus sheets were derived after processing the papyrus
plant. Some rolls of papyrus discovered are lengthy, up to 10 meters. The technique for crafting papyrus was lost over
time, but was rediscovered by an Egyptologist in the 1940s.

Papyrus texts illustrate all dimensions of ancient Egyptian life and include literary, religious, historical and administrative
documents. The pictorial script used in these texts ultimately provided the model for two most common alphabets in the
world, the Roman and the Arabic.

Ancient Egyptian paintings survived due to the extremely dry climate. The ancient Egyptians created paintings to make
the afterlife of the deceased a pleasant place. Accordingly, beautiful paintings were created. The themes included
journey through the afterworld or their protective deities introducing the deceased to the gods of the underworld. Some
examples of such paintings are paintings of Osiris and Warriors.