Thursday

Blinding of Polyphemus and Gorgons or Eleusis Amphora by Menaleus 675-650 B.C.E. 56" tall, Archaeological Museum, Eleusis Greece Orientalizing Period

Form: The ornamentation of this vase is organized into a series of registers or frets of almost equal size and this appears to be fairly common in black figure vases of the Orientalizing period. Each register is devoted to a scene which depicts mythological creatures or people. The ornamentation of the registers contains less geometricized and more naturalistic figures than the earlier geometric period's designs. Overall the design exhibits a similar horror vacui to the vases from Knossos in that every empty space on the vase has been filled with flower like rosettes or lozenge like forms. The figures are stylized curvilinear and cartoon like. The figures of the men in the top register are shown in a modified composite view whereas the Gorgons in the bottom most register are even more abstracted. Click on this link for more detailed views.

Developed initially in Corinth, the black-figure style in which the vase is decorated builds on the technology of earlier styles of decoration. The natural color of the clay is used as the back ground. Engobe is still used to create a silhouettes and touches of red purple gloss are applied here and there but the polychrome of the vase is supplemented by incising details with a sharp awl. This is sometime referred to as scraffito. Which means something along the order of scratched designs which is very similar to its cousin graffiti.

The vase is signed "Menaleus made me."

Iconography: The iconography of the vase deals with mythology and legend and outlines the adventures of two clever Greek heroes: Odysseus and Perseus. The top register depicts a scene out of Homer's "Odyssey" the Blinding of Polyphemus. (see Mencher Liaisons 12-14 (The Blinding of Polythemus). Odysseus or Ulysses, conquers the single eyed inhospitable Cyclops through his intelligence and scheming and therefore secures the release and safe journey of his crew.

The bottom most register depicts the three Gorgon sisters who had snakes for hair and were so hideous that if one looked upon them you would be transformed into stone. Medusa, committed and act of hubris or hybris (an act of disrespect, excessive pride or arrogance) by lying down with Poseiden in Athena's temple. In the tale of Perseus, he encounters the Gorgon Medusa, decapitates her and uses her head to freeze his enemies.

The monsters' physical attributes depicted in these tales summarize their failings. For example, the Cyclops is short of vision and the Gorgons are ugly of spirit and the snakes represent their deceit. The heroes are idealized versions of soldiers. They instruct us to be clever, loyal and be a soldier.

Context: This style represents a formal and iconographic correction of two earlier schemas. The formal correction is that the Corinthian artists who first developed the style took the existing technology and added the engraved scraffito. They also built on the initial designs of the geometric period and combined them with other culture's naturalistic manner of depicting animals and creatures. The subject matter changed from a simple funerary scene to a more decorative motif.

Art historians believe that these vases have an "eastern" or "oriental" or asian kind of feeling. Stokstad states, "the source of these motifs can be traced to the arts of the Near East, Asia Minor, and Egypt. The term "orientalized" although an accepted art historical term seems to have a rather Eurocentric meaning. The term seems to lump all the cultures east of Greece in this blanket term and therefore tends to generalize a bit too much.

Often you will see this vase referred to as a Proto-Attic amphora. The term Attic refers to its origins as Athenian. Proto- means early or before. This term is meant to demarcate the difference between vases made in the same orientalizing style in Corinth which are sometimes referred to as Proto-Corinthian .

The status of the artist must have been on the rise in Athens as well because this is one of the first examples of artwork that has been signed.

http://art-and-art-history-academy.usefedora.com/

This is part one of a year-long college-level survey course in art history. This course covers world art history from its prehistoric origins until the European Renaissance around 1300 A.D.

This course is designed as a basic college-level survey of art history. Although lectures are closed-captioned and I provide an online textbook as well as study guides and worksheets.

This course is the actual content of a course I taught at an accredited college in California called Ohlone college.

I designed this course as a series of clear, non-jargon laden video lectures and texts designed to help any student who wants to pass AP art history and or any beginning level art history survey course.

Tatoos and Patterns, 9 x 12 inches artist's crayon on sketchbook paper by Kenney Mencher
https://www.etsy.com/listing/481486545/tatoos-and-patterns-9-x-12-inches

Wednesday

Gay couple featured in Second Avenue subway mural

By Gabrielle Fonrouge

December 27, 2016 | 3:47pm

The 72nd Street station on the new Second Avenue subway line will feature a mural with a gay Manhattan couple holding hands and is meant to send a powerful message to commuters about the normalcy of gay New Yorkers.

Thor Stockman, 60, is pictured holding hands with his husband of 3 ½ years Patrick Kellogg and is part of Brazilian artist Vik Muniz’s series called “Perfect Strangers”— a collection of life-size mosaics of regular New Yorkers.

Muniz said the purpose of the series is to show the different kinds of people that commuters see on a daily basis and it makes sense to include the two men.

“They are just people you would expect to see,” said Muniz, who splits his time between New York and Brazil.

“You would expect to see men holding hands.”

For Stockman and his husband, finding out they were going to be featured “was like winning the lottery.”

The photo that became the basis for the mosaic was taken randomly three years ago in Brooklyn when Stockman and his husband met up with a friend who was working on the project.

The Second Avenue subway mural by Vik Muniz.AP

“We were hoping maybe we’ll get a nice portrait print out of this by standing there for five minutes,” Stockman said.

Little did they know, they’d get a call three years later saying their image would be cemented into a subway station.

They were asked to keep it under wraps while the specifics of the installation were still being sorted but when they were finally able to tell their friends, the reaction was joyous. Kellogg said it wasn’t just exciting because it was him and his husband, it was exciting because it was the sort of image of gay men that isn’t typically seen in pop culture.

“Our friends were happy that this is gay representation on the walls of New York City, but our friends were even happier that this is gay representation that is not incredibly beautiful and skinny,” Kellogg said.

His husband added, “They were just average-looking guys like us.”

Stockman is pictured with a full beard, a flannel shirt and a bulky jacket and pants. His partner Kellogg also has a full beard and is pictured in khaki work overalls with a large black duffel bag.

While the sight of two men or two women holding hands is far from rare in the Big Apple, artwork depicting their love is, according to Jonathan David Katz, an expert in gay art history.

Katz said there was no other example of a permanent, non-political LGBTQ public artwork in New York City besides the new mural. He referenced art works like George Segal’s “Gay Liberation Monument” near Stonewall Inn and how it commemorates a single political moment—not the day to day normalcy of gay New Yorkers.

The interior of the new Second Avenue subway station.David McGlynn

Katz added the work is long overdue in a city that’s “ostensibly the epicenter of both the art world and the gay movement.”

“What makes it a turning point is it isn’t gayness singled out and made the theme. On the contrary, the work naturalizes gayness within the fabric of the city, and in so doing, that’s actually an even more powerful message,” Katz said, who was the former executive coordinator of the Larry Kramer Initiative for Lesbian and Gay Studies at Yale University.

The chief curator for the project Nicholas Baume said the work reminds him that it’s a “common occurrence to see a gay couple holding hands waiting on a subway platform in New York City.”

“It’s great that it’s no longer a taboo for men to show this kind of everyday affection.”

The station and art work will be open to the public on Jan. 1.

With Post Wires

Egyptian Art and its Formal and Symbolic Qualities cc

http://art-and-art-history-academy.usefedora.com/

This is part one of a year-long college-level survey course in art history. This course covers world art history from its prehistoric origins until the European Renaissance around 1300 A.D.

This course is designed as a basic college-level survey of art history. Although lectures are closed-captioned and I provide an online textbook as well as study guides and worksheets.

This course is the actual content of a course I taught at an accredited college in California called Ohlone college.

I designed this course as a series of clear, non-jargon laden video lectures and texts designed to help any student who wants to pass AP art history and or any beginning level art history survey course.

Too Easily Upset, 8x10 inches oil on canvas panel, by Kenney Mencher

https://www.etsy.com/listing/479890044/too-easily-upset-8x10-inches-oil-on

Tuesday

Musicians and Dancers from the Tomb of Nebamun 1400 BCE - 1350 BCE Thebes, Egypt Dynasty 18

Form: Some of the earlier Egyptian conventions of depiction (the "memory image and composite view) are not followed in this image. Although the two women on the left have been portrayed in a classic manner, the middle two are shown in a very unusual frontal and naturalistic position. In the depiction of the figures arms is a bit of an attempt to show foreshortening of the limbs. As their arms project into the foreground they become shorter to create the illusion of space. The two figures to the far right are overlapping also creating a slight illusion of space.

Iconography and Context: These dancing girls were probably meant as entertainment for Nebamun in his afterlife and were not very high in the cultures hierarchy. The break from tradition in depicting these figures could represent the influence of Akhenaton's reign on Egyptian art but these distortions are most likely due to the relaxation of rules governing the depictions of lesser known or less important individuals as in the depiction of the Seated Scribe 2525 BCE from Saqqara, Egypt.

http://art-and-art-history-academy.usefedora.com/

This is part one of a year-long college-level survey course in art history. This course covers world art history from its prehistoric origins until the European Renaissance around 1300 A.D.

This course is designed as a basic college-level survey of art history. Although lectures are closed-captioned and I provide an online textbook as well as study guides and worksheets.

This course is the actual content of a course I taught at an accredited college in California called Ohlone college.

I designed this course as a series of clear, non-jargon laden video lectures and texts designed to help any student who wants to pass AP art history and or any beginning level art history survey course.