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Classical
Question 1: Define the following terms: aręte, classical, humanism, polis, and schemata.
Answer 1: Aręte is personal excellence. It is achieved when one becomes more powerful, stronger, or otherwise better than one’s rivals and competition. It was a central part of the competitive Greek society.Classical, in the strictest sense, applies only to works created in the fourth and fifth centuries b.c. It employs principles of clarity, consistency, and the supremacy of formal design.Humanism is the belief that man and his faculties are the measures of all things. In art, humanism is a focus on man, his abilities, and his doings, and was a driving influence in Greek and Roman artwork.Polis was the Greek city-state, and consisted of four main parts: the wall for defense; the agora, or town center; the akropolis, or citadel; and the necropolis, or cemetery. It was a major influence in Greek art. Schemata (singular, schema) are patterns or formulas. In art, they are descriptions of human anatomy and their many variations (slim, round, muscular, athletic, etc.
There are lots of good resources about Classical that you can find available.
Question 2: Discuss early Greek art.
Answer 2: Early Greek art can be divided into two main categories: secular and sacred. Common examples of sacred artwork include temples for the gods, sculptures made for temples and graveyards, votive offerings such as vases and gifts for dead ancestors, and religious home ornaments. Secular artwork includes monumental architecture, monumental sculptures, figure drawings, and pictorial narratives. Ancient Greek art has the following qualities:Individualistic: It was created by individual artists competing within a specific market and constantly refining their styles.Experimental: It was constantly using new forms and techniques.Dogmatic: Each new form and technique replaced the previous forms and techniques, making them obsolete.Early Greek art was largely humanistic in scope; it focused on man, his doings, his search for aręte, and his role in the polis. It also sought realism, balance in proportion, and an understanding of nature.
Question 3: Discuss the kouros.
Answer 3: The kouros, or nude striding model, is a Greek sculpture form that began appearing after 650 b.c. It was influenced heavily by ancient Egyptian sculpture; however, unlike the Egyptians, the Greeks display a completely nude male form with the torso weight distributed between two legs so it faces the viewer directly. This direct facing is so common in Greek sculpture that it is known as the law of frontality. Because of the kouros, the nude male form became the most popular subject in Greek sculpture. These statues are normally of marble and serve a variety of uses, including funerary, votive (for offerings), and statuary (for the gods). In the Greek tradition, beauty was a function of proper proportioning, and Greek sculptors sought total accuracy in the sizing and proportion of parts of the male anatomy. The female anatomy was given far less attention. Sculptures of female forms were called kore, and were generally adorned with clothing and jewelry, such as the Peplos Kore.
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