Saturday, January 16, 2010
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ARCHITECTURAL SCULPTURE
Archaism saw the advent of the kouros and the kore, themes which, despite subsequent stylistic evolution, dominated all subsequent statuary, it can also be credited with resolving the problem of adapting ornamental sculpture to the architecture of temples and treasuries.
While non-figurative sculpture consisting of flutings and mouldings appears almost everywhere on buildings, sculpted images are found in only three places: on the frieze running above the colonnade, in the pediments, and on the angles of the roof which can carry akroterial statues. Aleroteria leave the sculptor plenty of freedom because they stand out in the open, but friezes and pediments are different: they suffer the constraints of a set architectural framework which simply has to be accepted. Temples have two triangular pediments because they retained the very simple architectonics of a saddle roof with the two slopes descending to the longer sides of the budding, leaving a triangular gap at the ridge—line of the shorter sides. The explanation of the frieze, particularly the Done frieze, is a matter of more debate, but it certainly has nothing to do with the sculptural decoration which may be found in that position, as witness the fact that it is usually absent. Since metopes with relief are a more attractive sight than those without, books and museums show only the former, helping us to forget that the latter are very much in the majority and that the arrangement of a Done frieze is clearly independent of sculptural imagery. since most such friezes have none. The interest, then, lies in seeing how sculptors adapted to these architectural precondidons, and what procedures they tried and finally adopted.
First comes the Done frieze, a set of alternating triglyphs (vertical bands and grooves) and metopes (square blocks). Some triglyphs did bear sculptural images but very rarely and very late: on Delos, in the Portico of Antigone which dates from the third century, one out of two triglyphs has the head of an ox in very prominent relief; in the first century, baskets and sheaves of corn ornament the triglyphs on the small Propylaia at Eleusis. It was the metopes rather than the triglyphs which were sometimes carved with legendary scenes.
The constraints imposed on the sculptor were of two kinds. The first derives from the fact that the metope, considered individually, is both a restricted and an autonomous surface. It is restricted because it is square,, or almost so, and thus unsuitable for showing more than two or three figures, since if one of them, shown standing, occupies the entire height of the area there is space horizontally for only one or two other characters. It is autonomous, because it is separated from its neighbour by a triglyph, forming a break in the pattern and making it difficult to depict scenes with many participants. Secondly, the metopes are never isolated, but come in groups either large or small (six on the wall of the cella in the Temple of Zeus at Olympia, thirty-two on the long sides of the Parthenon), an invitation to the artist not only to produce a whole series of images (although he was not really obliged to, and most of the lateral metopes of the Hephaisteion at Athens remain bare) but to give them an iconographic link by choosing scenes from the same story.
In the monuments known to us, this initial situation is dealt with in different ways. First, there is the difficulty created by the restricted size and autonomy of each metope. The simplest solution is to take no notice of it by simply ignoring the breaks of the triglyphs. This is what the sculptor ornamenting the Sicyonian treasury at Delphi did around 6o BC; the same scene can continue through several successive metopes. Thus the boar of the Calydonian Hunt occupies one of the metopes on his own, while his assailants are shown on the neighbouring metopes, attacking him as if the intervening triglyphs were not there at all. Or there is the ship Argo, her prow shown in one of the metopes and the rest of the vessel probably continuing over one or two more. When a scene divided up between two or three metopes in this way was finished, the artist passed on to another, and the triglyph did not signal a change of subject; once it had been ignored through the depiction of a long scene, it had lost its role as an iconographic break. In the very early fifth century, on the Athenian Treasury at Delphi, the capture by Herakles of Geryon’s cattle occupied six metopes, whde each of the hero’s other labours was confined to a single metope.
Here is the second possible approach, the reverse of the first: the autonomy of the metope can be respected and exploited if a complete scene is placed in it This was the approach which prevailed from the fifth century onwards. It is hard to tell where it was invented, but it certainly appeared very early. Again in the Sicyonian Treasury, there
are metopes showing self-contained subjects such as Europa crossing the sea on the back of the bull, a scene which, thus reduced to the two protagonists, is entirely complete, as many later parallels show us. It is found at Sehnus (Selinate) as early as the beginning of the sixth century, in Temple C, which is exactly contemporary with the Sicyonian Treasury. Each of the three metopes which have been preserved contains a complete scene: a quadriga or four-horse chariot driven by Apollo, seen from the front; Perseus killing the Corgon; and Herakles carrying off the Kerkopes. A little later, in Temple E of the early fifth century, metopes show Herakles fighting the Amazon, the wedding of Zeus and Hera, Athena fighting a giant, and the punishment of Actaeon.
It is striking, however, that the three scenes in Temple C belong to completely separate stories, as do the four scenes in Temple E; the legend of Heraldes, for instance, has no connection with the story of Acraeon. In other words, the imagery here respects what we defined as the first constraint imposed by the Done frieze — the autonomy of each metope — but not the second, namely, their grouping together in a way which invites us to link them by means of an iconographic connection. Of course, our evidence is restricted, and it is certainly dangerous to draw conclusions from only three or four metopes, but Temples C and E at Selinus do at least help us to see that the autonomy of each metope need not imply iconographic homogeneity throughout the series.
‘A third approach is to combine both solutions. This method was the one usually adopted from the fifth century onwards, but it seems to make its first appearance much earlier, for instance in the Heraion of Silaris (Foce del Sele) near Paestum. The temple of Zeus at Olympia certaioly provides the most complete illustration, dating from around 460 BC: twelve metopes crown the shorter sides of the temple, six on the east side and six on the west side, depicting the twelve labours of Herakies. Each metope is independent, accommodating a different episode shown in its entirety, without spilling over into neighbouring metopes, but the series is still a unit because it illustrates the deeds of a single hero.
The counterpart of the Done frieze is the Ionic frieze. It might be better described as the continuous frieze, since it is not only found above the architraves of Ionic temples (replacing the metopes and triglyphs of the Done temple). In the last quarter of the seventh century the Ionic or continuous frieze is found not only above the architrave of the Temple of Prinias in Crete, carved with horsemen, but on the lintel of its gateway, where a line of animals parades past; and then, in the middle of the next century, on the architrave of the Temple of Assos in the Troad, showing various subjects such as people feasting and the labours of Herakles. In the fifth century, the “Ionic frieze” appears on Done temples: for example, the Parthenon,
the Hephaistesun at Athens, Temple of Cape Soumon and the Temple of Apollo at Bassae . The frieze continues its existence outside Greece, ornamenting buildings of foreign types such as the Monument of the Nereids at Xanthos and the Mausoleum of Halikarnassus , and, in the second century, it appears twice
on the Great Altar of Pergamum.
The characteristics of Ionic or continuous frieze are exactly the opposite of those of the Doric frieze, and it therefore calls for very different methods of depiction.
There is no break like that provided by the triglyphs, and thus no horizontal restriction of space, nor, consequently, any division into a series of autonomous areas. Instead we have the continuity of a single uninterrupted band which is as long as the side of the building on which it is placed. The problems of this architectural constraint are no longer best solved by showing an episode with two or three actors, but by a scene involving an unsuccessful number of characters, thus giving the sculptor the latitude to add or subtract figures depending on the length of the space which needs to be filled.
Here again, however, aligning and multiplying figures is one thing; providing them with an iconographic link is another. At Assns, different subjects were shown in succession: the band is continuous but the relief is pictorially discontinuous. At about the same period, however — a passage in Herodotns dates it to around 525 BC — each side of the Siphnian Treasury at Delphi is entirely occupied by a single subject and two of the subjects (the battle of the gods and the giants, and the battle between Greeks and Trojans in the presence of the gods) were chosen from scenes offering both sufficient characters to fill the entire surface and a sufficiently variable cast—list for the absence of any one character to pass unnoticed.
As this last method — iconographic homogeneity — was subsequently adopted, it is easy to understand why the favourite subjects for Ionic or continuous friezes were centauromachies, Amazonomachies and other battles in which the number of combatants could be chosen at will.
Many pediments are populated with figures in relief and, almost always, with statues more or less finished at the back. However, it was not self-evident that this should be so, for the triangular nature of the space available, imposed by the architectonics of the roof, had certain consequences for the sculptor.
The first was a difficulty that could not be avoided: it is impossible to show characters of the same dimensions in a triangular frame whose height progressively diminished from the centre outwards. Sculptors found various ways of dealing with the necessity of decreasing the height of figures in the same scene. One was to make the characters smaller and smaller in relation to their proximity to the angles: that is, they varied the module. This method was very seldom employed, but it is well represented by the pediment of the Temple of Artemis at Corfu, dating from the first quarter of the sixth century, where the enormous central Gorgon is flanked by the much smaller figure of Chrysaor, while even smaller characters fill the angles.
The other solution is to vary not the module but the attitude of the figures, showing them standing in the centre, then kneeling, and finally lying in the angles. This method appears very early, on the Siphusan Treasury at Delphi around 525 BC, and some years later in the Temple of the Alkmaionids, where the angles of the pediment show, for instance, a kneeling armour-bearer in one angle and in the other a recumbent triton, or lions devouring their prey. Also employed around the same time in the Megarian treasury at Olympia, this second approach was the one subsequently adopted, which is not surprising; Archaism had already accepted images using figures on disparate modules (a vase, for instance, shows a hare running on a tree-grown hill, with the hare almost the same size as the trees), but as painters and sculptors had been striving towards the greatest possible similarity between image and reality, the approach adopted at Corfu soon ceased to be acceptable, and it was necessary to find a better pictorial response to architectural constraints. Just as the metope favours subjects with two or three actors, and the continuous frieze favours subjects involving many characters, in this case the necessity for showing people lying and kneeling made battle scenes popular although not obligatory for pediments.
The second consequence of the triangular shape of the pediment was less a constraint than an invitation. Unlike the rectangular frame of the frieze, whether Done or Ionic, the triangular frame of the pediment has an axis well marked by the line bisecting it from the upper angle, and divides into two symmetrical wings (it is interesting that in ancient Greek the pediment was known as aetos, “eagle”, suggesting that bird’s outspread wings). Now there was nothing to say that the image must fit this geometry. Indeed, the axiality was ignored by several of the small Archaic pediments on the Acropolis at Athens, such as the Olive Tree pediment, and there was no symmetry of the wings in the great Archaic pediment (again on the Actopohs) often called the Bluebeard or Old Man of the Sea pediment, which shows Hercules fighting a triton on the left, and on the right a monster with three heads and a triple serpentine tail watching the fight . Images of this kind, however, disappear at the end of the sixth century, and around 480 BC, in the Temple of Aphaia at Aegina, we find an axial figure set below the upper angles of the pediments, while symmetrical characters match each other in the wings.
But, just as respecting the autonomy of metopes and the continuity of the Ionic frieze did not necessarily imply any concern for iconographic homogeneity, so homogeneity of theme can he seen as a separate issue from the need to accommodate the diminishing height of the tympanal frame. Thematically, the lions on the pediment at Corfu have no connection with the central group showing the Gorgon and Chrysaor, or with the small figures in the angles; nor do those filling the angles of the pediment on the Temple of the Alkmaionids at Delphi. A concern for iconographic homogeneity can also be dissociated from a concern for axial and symmetrical organization. Even though it lacks a central figure, and shows two wholly asymmetrical groups, the “Bluebeard” pediment is still a single iconographic unit.
As with the friezes, uncertainty about methods of responding to the pre—imposed constraints of architecture ended in the early fifth century. The definitive formula was adopted in 480 BC at the Temple of Aegina, and even more perfectly, twenty years later, at the Temple of Zeus in Olympia. Here the east pediment exploits a variety of attitudes, and is perfectly adapted to the axiality and symmetry of the tympanal triangle. It shows the central figure of Zeus, slightly larger than the humans standing next to him, Pelops and Oinomaos; next, and still observing symmetry, come the bride-to-be of one man and the wife of the other, then quadrigae (four—horse chariot teams), then kneeling or seated figures, and finally, lying in the angles, personifications of the two local rivers, the Alpheios and Kladeos, watching the episode in which royal status will pass from Oinomaos to Pelops. The battle of the Lapiths and the centaurs on the west pediment is composed in the same way, this time dominated by the axial figure of Apollo.
It will be obvious that the above account is not an exhaustive study of the friezes and pediments. We have been exclusively concerned here with considering how their ornamentation adapts in material and pictorial terms to the building on which it stands, but beyond these architectural conditions there is much more to be said about each work. For instance, let us take the metopes of the Temple of Zeus at Olympia. It ii noteworthy that several of them treat the labours of Herakles in a new way. While contemporary vase painting always shows the story of the Lion of Nemea as a struggle between the hero and the wild beast, here the lion is dead and Herakles, his foot on its hide, stands motionless beneath the gaze of Athena. Similarly, while vase paintings show Herakles shooting at a whole flock of the Stymphalian birds, here the hunt is over and Herakles contents himself with presenting a dead bird to Athena, who is seated on a rock. As a story unfolds, the artist is free to show this or that part of it, just as one can choose this or that still from a film. The choice taken in these three metopes has the quasi—theological effect of directing the viewer’s attention away from the strength and skill of Herakles and concentrating it on the divine aid of Athena, without which, as a human, he would have found has exploits impossible. However, there is also a formal effect; the frieze as a whole has scenes of immobility introduced into it, in contrast with such scenes of action as the metope of the cleansing of the Augean stables. In the same way, the static nature of the figures on the east pediment contrasts with the lively movement of the Lapiths and centaurs on the west pediment (in a manner we shall encounter again on the Parthenon).. The sculptor has also taken pains to vary the battle scenes by varying their composition, which is pyramidal in the metopes showing the hind with brazen hooves and the queen of the Amazons, and X-shaped for the metopes depicting the horses of Diomedes and the Cretan bull.
The temples and treasuries of canonical architecture were not the only sites for sculptural decoration. Thasos provides ample illustration. The walls of a public passageway called the Way of the Theores (because the names of those magistrates were carved there) bore reliefs, now in the Louvre, showing Apollo with nymphs on one side, Hermes and the Graces on the other. More reliefs are carved on the uprights of the main gates of the ramparts, showing a goddess in a chariot, Herakies and Dionysus, Zeus and Hera, and a Silenus with erect phallus carrying a kantharos cup.
Finally, it was quite common to protect buildings with “apotropaic” images, so called because they were supposed to have the power of turning away evil spirits. This must certainly be the purpose of the Gorgon on the Corfu pediment. However, such images were also found carved in relief on private dwellings. Around the year 100 BC the outer walls of several houses on Delos show the bonnets of the Dioskouroi on their outer walls, or the club of Herakles, or an enormous phallus, the corresponding Latin name for which underlines its power of “fascination” in the sense of a spell or charm, or even all three at once.
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