Antiquities Exhibits

In the early 600s BCE, new artistic ideas flowed into Greece as a result of increased contacts with the Near East. Because of Crete’s central location along maritime trade routes between these regions, artists on the island played a leading role in synthesizing native and Near Eastern elements. An artist from Crete that became known as Daidalos (Daedalus) , produced a series of female figurines that combined both Greek and Near Eastern features including triangular faces and stylized wig-like hair forming two upward-facing triangles on either side of the face.  The top of the head is flattened to maintain triangularity, giving a “brainless look”, according to some scholars, and producing a low forehead with a straight hairline. The eyes are usually large and set rather high.The woman is portrayed in a frontal orientation and the female's clothing was often depicted as formless drapery or as a simple style, sometimes decorated with geometric patterns, tied with a wide belt at the wa...

The Villa Giulia Painter decorated vases in Athens during the period from about 470 to 440 B.C. He worked primarily in the red-figure technique, but he also produced some white-ground pieces. Most of his work appears to have been on large vessels, especially kraters of various forms. The Villa Giulia Painter usually favored quiet scenes, but he also included many depictions of Dionysiac religion and unusual myths. As with most ancient artists, the real name of the Villa Giulia Painter is unknown, and he is identified only by the stylistic traits of his work. Scholars named him after a krater in the Villa Giulia Museum in Rome. - Getty Museum According to classicist John Beazley, The Villa Giulia Painter's work was representative of the "academic wing of early classic vase-painting”, whose best works are distinguished by “a quiet nobility.”  Some of his work also includes a kalos or "love name" applied near a depicted character. Vase painters commonly added these term...

As often happens, when I was looking for images to illustrate my Ancient Wisdom post yesterday and came across that endearing painting of a little boy frightening his little brother with a Roman tragic mask by Belgian painter Pierre Olivier Joseph Coomans, I noticed that despite his prolific body of work, Coomans did not have a biography on English Wikipedia  so I spent all day yesterday and this morning researching and writing a biography for him including a gallery of his work. I discovered he had a very eventful life. His work was already exhibition quality by the time he was 16 years old. After studying at the Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp, he was commissioned by Queen Marie-Louise to accompany Marshal Thomas-Robert Bugeaud to Algeria where he spent several years as a military painter. Then he was dispatched to the Crimean War serving on the staff of General Aimable Pélissier. He eventually contracted cholera on the battlefield and went to Greece, Turkey, and Italy to recup...

The Neo-Pompeiian art of Eduardo Ettore Forti now online on Wikipedia. Like many neo-classical painters of the late 19th century, Ettore Forti, became enthralled by ancient Roman life after the rediscovery of Pompeii in 1748 and the subsequent excavations. Although many of his extant paintings feature scenes of merchants selling carpets, jewelry, or antiquities to well-to-do Roman ladies, he also painted scenes of chariot  racing, musicians, city folk gossiping around a fountain, and even coaches bearing emperors careening down the roads leading back to Rome. These images can now be viewed online in a gallery on Ettore Forti's Wikipedia page. I searched the internet for over a week to collect as many images of his work as I could find and upload them to Wikimedia Commons (since they are now in the public domain). I strongly believe images bring history to life so I've been working hard to identify images in the public domain that portray ancient life and uploading them to W...