Metropolitan Museum Paper
Emily Wilson
October 10th, 2014
Professor Cruz
Art into History
Greek and Roman Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art has many different exhibits with ancient portraits, sculptures, steles, freezes, paintings and many more. The Greek and Roman exhibit was very interesting. The way the Greeks and Romans portrayed their feelings and life experiences through art is very diverse. During my visit to Metropolitan, I had gone for a tour of this exhibit and was amazed by the works of art I was seeing. Just knowing it was from thousands of years ago, the struggles and tools they used to make these pieces is incredible. Christy Wilkinson, my tour guide, really opened my eyes to the history and background of these pieces of art.
The Greeks and Romans had many different periods of art that they went through. For example, the Greeks had the Classical, Archaic and Hellenistic, while the Romans had the Republican, and Etruscan. These are just some of the periods they both had.
Starting with the Greeks the first piece of art Christy took us to see were the Cycladic figures. The Cycladic figures were small stone statuettes made of marble and are nearly five thousand years old. They were given as funerary offerings only in the archaic period. They were a whitish or reddish brown color; this is because they were buried for hundreds of year. Dirt was red so over time it became dyed. Christy stated that “95% of the Cycladic figures were female and that the males were extremely rare”. Luckily the museum had a male. Marble was a “backyard” stone at the time so the figures weren’t that expensive. They used two volcanic products to shape and design the statuettes. The first was obsidian for chipping and emery for sanding the figure to make it smooth. Since equipment was so minimal the Cycladic figures are not very detailed, especially the women. The women had no eyes, very long slender noses, large heads, there arms were crossed and folded over their chest and had legs and feet.
October 10th, 2014
Professor Cruz
Art into History
Greek and Roman Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art has many different exhibits with ancient portraits, sculptures, steles, freezes, paintings and many more. The Greek and Roman exhibit was very interesting. The way the Greeks and Romans portrayed their feelings and life experiences through art is very diverse. During my visit to Metropolitan, I had gone for a tour of this exhibit and was amazed by the works of art I was seeing. Just knowing it was from thousands of years ago, the struggles and tools they used to make these pieces is incredible. Christy Wilkinson, my tour guide, really opened my eyes to the history and background of these pieces of art.
The Greeks and Romans had many different periods of art that they went through. For example, the Greeks had the Classical, Archaic and Hellenistic, while the Romans had the Republican, and Etruscan. These are just some of the periods they both had.
Starting with the Greeks the first piece of art Christy took us to see were the Cycladic figures. The Cycladic figures were small stone statuettes made of marble and are nearly five thousand years old. They were given as funerary offerings only in the archaic period. They were a whitish or reddish brown color; this is because they were buried for hundreds of year. Dirt was red so over time it became dyed. Christy stated that “95% of the Cycladic figures were female and that the males were extremely rare”. Luckily the museum had a male. Marble was a “backyard” stone at the time so the figures weren’t that expensive. They used two volcanic products to shape and design the statuettes. The first was obsidian for chipping and emery for sanding the figure to make it smooth. Since equipment was so minimal the Cycladic figures are not very detailed, especially the women. The women had no eyes, very long slender noses, large heads, there arms were crossed and folded over their chest and had legs and feet.