1. PALEOLITHIC ART– primary forms of visual activity of homo sapiens sapiens, appearing in the Upper Paleolithic (Aurignac) about 40–30 thousand years ago. Monuments of Paleolithic art - cave wall paintings and drawings, as well as various types of sculpture - have been preserved mainly in the southwest of France and in the adjacent part of the Iberian Peninsula. They are found sporadically in Northern and Eastern Europe, the Alps, Ukraine, the Southern Urals and Siberia.
The first traces of primitive art date back to the Upper or Late Paleolithic era, which began approximately several tens of millennia BC, in the so-called Aurignacian time. These are rock paintings; figurines made of stone and bone; images and ornamental patterns carved on pieces of deer antlers or on stone slabs. They are found in Europe, Asia, and Africa. Meanwhile, the production of primitive stone tools dates back to much more ancient times of the Lower and Middle Paleolithic. Labor is older than art, and art owes its emergence to labor. If a person had not exercised and refined his hand, had not developed the fidelity of his eye, processing for the sake of obtaining food such a difficult-to-process material as stone, he would not have been able to learn to draw. Life of the primitive a person depended on a successful hunt. Therefore, he especially carefully observed the animals he hunted, their habits, their lives. He noticed that if he drew a picture of the animal he was hunting and then, with certain words, threw a spear at it, then the hunt was more successful. Thus, in many caves around the world, numerous images of animals appeared, in front of which magical rituals were performed. The tendency of primitive man to depict animals is called the zoological or animal style in art, and for their diminutiveness, small figurines and images of animals were called plastics of small forms. For a long time, scientists did not could believe that in such ancient times, at such a primitive level of development of productive forces, people who made only primitive scrapers, knives, spearheads could be artists of such a high class. This is evidenced by the dramatic history of the discovery of the first cave with Paleolithic drawings - Altamira .Hunting large animals often ended in death. Therefore, the problem of reproduction was very pressing for primitive people. Women had to give birth regularly so that with such a high mortality rate the tribe would not die out. Women were given a special place. Matriarchy reigned in primitive tribes. Therefore, some of the oldest works of art that have come down to us were small female figurines, which were jokingly called “Paleolithic Venuses.” In these figurines, all the attention of the ancient sculptor was focused precisely on the reproductive function of the female body, that is, on what the life of the tribe depended on.
2. MESOLITHIC
Mesolithic man made fuller use of the natural resources around him than his predecessors. Hunting methods have become more diverse. The role of individual hunting with a dog increased sharply, and a variety of traps, traps, and snares began to be used. Fishing took a significant place in the economy. Fish were hunted with a harpoon; nets, fishing hooks, and tops first appeared and quickly spread. In the Mesolithic, the wooden dugout boat and oar were invented. Marine fishing arose on the coasts.
Mesolithic art
During the Mesolithic era, or Middle Stone Age (XII-VIII millennium BC), the climatic conditions on the planet changed. Some animals that were hunted have disappeared; others came to meet them. Fishing began to develop. People created new types of tools, weapons (bows and arrows), and tamed the dog. All these changes certainly had an impact on the consciousness of primitive man, which was reflected in art.
This is evidenced, for example, by rock paintings in the coastal mountainous regions of Eastern Spain, between the cities of Barcelona and Valencia. Previously, the focus of the ancient artist’s attention was on the animals he hunted, now on human figures depicted in rapid motion. If the Paleolithic cave paintings represented separate, unrelated figures, then in the Mesolithic rock paintings, multi-figure compositions and scenes began to predominate, which vividly reproduce various episodes from the life of hunters of that time. In addition to various shades of red paint, black and occasionally white were used, and egg white, blood and, possibly, honey served as a persistent binder.
Central to the rock art were hunting scenes, in which hunters and animals are linked by energetically unfolding action. Hunters follow the trail or pursue prey, sending a hail of arrows at it as they run, delivering the final, fatal blow, or running away from an angry, wounded animal. At the same time, images of dramatic episodes of military clashes between tribes appeared. In some cases, apparently, we are even talking about execution: in the foreground there is a figure of a lying man pierced by arrows, in the second there is a close row of shooters raising their bows. Images of women are rare: they are usually static and lifeless. Large paintings were replaced by small ones. But the detail of the compositions and the number of characters are amazing: sometimes there are hundreds of images of humans and animals. Human figures are very conventional; they are rather symbols that serve to depict crowd scenes. The primitive artist freed the figures from everything, from his point of view, that was secondary, which would interfere with the transmission and perception of complex poses, action, the very essence of what is happening. For him, a person is, first of all, an embodied movement.
Towards the end of the Mesolithic, a woman invents a clay pot that is very useful in the household. On wet clay, you can make wavy lines with your fingertips and dashes with a stick. For beauty and to strengthen the pottery with magic. This is how ornament arises - women's art.
Thus, the Mesolithic period is a time of great economic changes associated with the breaking of the established traditions of farming and mammoth hunting techniques that had been established for thousands of years; it is an era of new fundamental changes in technology, the invention of the bow and arrow, fishing tools, and the time of the appearance of the boat. However, the changes noted did not always occur evenly and not everywhere in the same way; Separate local areas with their own characteristics emerged. With the current level of knowledge, three unique economic zones can be distinguished: the Black Sea region, where gathering develops and the beginnings of animal husbandry arise; the forest zone of Eurasia, where hunting and fishing develop, and the zone of coastal cultures of fishermen and sea animal hunters.
3. Altamira
(altamira), a cave in the Cantabrian Mountains (Spain) with rock paintings from the Late Paleolithic era (Madeleine era, 15-10th thousand BC). Discovered in 1868; in 1875 it was explored by the Spanish archaeologist Marcelino de Sautuola, who found stone tools in it, and in 1879 - many images of animals. Sautuola called Altamira "the Sistine Chapel of rock art."
Altamira stretches underground for almost 380 m, but the main images (bulls, horses, wild boars, deer, mountain goats and bison) are located near the entrance to the cave in the so-called. “main hall” 18 m long. The appearance and habit of each animal are perfectly conveyed: the animals are either calm, lazily resting, or they attack menacingly, jumping with their legs tucked in and their horns pointed forward. Primitive masters, using the natural unevenness of the wall, were able to masterfully convey volume and movement. Flawlessly mastering the line, confidently and without correction, with one movement of the hand, the ancient artists outlined with a black outline the overweight carcass of a bison or the slender silhouette of a deer.
Images of animals had a magical meaning for primitive man: by painting on the wall the figure of a boar or bison pierced by a spear, the ancient painter ensured the tribe good luck in the hunt. Images of defeated animals were repeated on the walls of the cave again and again by many generations of primitive masters, as a sacred rite is endlessly repeated; therefore, the painting as a whole is a chaotic accumulation of large images hanging overhead, between which there are no plot or compositional connections and which often overlap each other. The paintings were made with bright mineral paints (ochre, manganese, kaolin, limonites, hematites), which were mixed with water or animal fat. The visual authenticity and vitality of Altamira's wall paintings became a classic example of monumental primitive "realism".
LASCO CAVE
The Lascaux cave was discovered on September 12, 1940 by French schoolchildren from the town of Montignac. They accidentally discovered a cave, the walls of which were completely covered with amazing drawings of people and animals - bulls, bison, rhinoceroses, horses, deer, drawn life-size with ocher, soot and marl and outlined in dark outlines.
The rock paintings of the Lascaux cave belong to the Solutrean archaeological culture, their age is 18 - 15 thousand years BC. In total there are more than 2000 drawings, including images of bulls, bison, cows, horses, cats, bison, one image of a reindeer, fuzzy and sketchy, people, as well as some signs, symbols, dots.
Ocher, manganese oxide and iron oxide were widely used among dyes. Ancient artists crushed the mineral, and the resulting dye was mixed with water or animal fat. The technique of applying paint with water is similar to the watercolor technique. In addition to this technique, the artists used engraving - they cut out the outlines of the image in the walls of the cave and filled them with paint.
4. Megaliths(from the Greek μέγας - large, λίθος - stone) - structures made of huge stone blocks, characteristic mainly of the Neolithic and Bronze Age.
All megaliths can be divided into two categories. The first includes the most ancient architectural structures of prehistoric (preliterate) societies (temples of the island of Malta, menhirs, cromlechs, dolmens). For them, stones were either not processed at all or with minimal processing. The cultures that left these monuments are called megalithic. Megaliths often include structures made of fairly small stones (labyrinths) and individual stones with petroglyphs (traces). Some buildings of more advanced societies (the tombs of Japanese emperors and dolmens of the Korean nobility) carry a similar architectural aesthetic.
The second category consists of structures of more developed architecture, largely consisting of very large stones, which are usually given a geometrically regular shape. They are typical for early states, but were also built in later times. In the Mediterranean, for example, these are the pyramids of Egypt, the buildings of the Mycenaean culture, and the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. In South America - some buildings in Tiwanaku, Sacsayhuaman, Ollantaytambo.
A common characteristic feature of megaliths are stone blocks, slabs or blocks weighing sometimes more than a hundred tons, often delivered from quarries located tens of kilometers away, sometimes with a large difference in height relative to the construction site. At the same time, the stones in some types of structures had a perfectly tight fit at the seams (Dolmens of the Western Caucasus, burial chambers and cladding of the pyramids of Egypt, the best buildings of the Incas).
The most common megalithic structure in Europe, the dolmen, is a chamber or crypt of vertically hewn monoliths on which rest one or more large flat stones that make up the “roof.” Many, although not all, contain the remains of people buried inside.
The second most common type of megalithic burial is the corridor tomb. It usually consists of a rectangular, circular or cross-shaped chamber with a flat or projecting roof at the edges, to which a long straight passage leads. The entire structure is covered with earth on top, forming a kind of mound, into which an entrance made of stone blocks opens. Sometimes the edge of the mound is bordered by a stone border. The most remarkable examples are Brú na Bóinne in Ireland, Bryn Kelly Dee in Wales, Maeshowe in the Orkney Islands and Gavriny in Brittany.
The third type is a variety of tombs in the form of galleries, for example, the Severn Cotswolds. In plan they have axial symmetry and consist of rows of chambers covered with elongated mounds. Individual or grouped menhirs and stone circles are also common, which in Russian-language literature are also called cromlechs, like Welsh dolmens. The latter type includes Stonehenge, Avebury, the Circle of Brodgar and hundreds of other similar monuments. Like menhirs, they were important astronomical devices for observing the sun and moon and are usually not as ancient as megalithic burials.
5. NEOLITHIC AND ENEOLITHIC ART
Neolithic (from Greek néos - new and Greek líthos - stone), New Stone Age, the era of the later Stone Age, characterized by the use exclusively of flint, bone and stone tools (including those made using sawing, drilling and grinding techniques) and , as a rule, a wide distribution of pottery. The tools of the Neolithic era represent the final stage of the development of stone tools, which were then replaced by metal products appearing in increasing quantities. According to cultural and economic characteristics, Neolithic cultures fall into two groups: 1) farmers and cattle breeders and 2) developed hunters and fishermen
In the Old World, the most ancient agricultural and pastoral cultures in the Middle East, according to the latest data, date back to the 8th-7th millennium BC. They often lack pottery altogether, which is why they are classified as Protoneolithic, or Pre-Ceramic Neolithic. These cultures are characterized by the existence of settled settlements with adobe houses (sometimes on stone foundations), the presence of perimeter walls (Jericho), the proliferation of sanctuaries, often richly decorated with reliefs and fresco paintings (Çatalhöyük), as well as clay figurines of people and animals and various decorations in the form of necklaces, bracelets and pendants. Flat-bottomed painted ceramics, which appeared in the cultures of the Near East, flourished already in the era of the use of metal products (Hassoun culture, Halaf culture). Neolithic cultures of this type are represented in the south of Central Asia by Jeitun (6th millennium BC), and in Transcaucasia by Shomutepe and Shulaveri (5-4th millennium BC). The agricultural Neolithic of China dates back to the 4th-3rd millennium BC.
In Europe, Neolithic cultures of farmers and herders first appear in Macedonia at the end of the 7th millennium BC. (Neo-Nicomedia), and then in the 6th-4th millennium BC. e. distributed in the Balkans and Central Europe (Starčevo, Karanovo, Vinča Körös, Linear Band Ware cultures, etc.).
Neolithic cultures of developed hunters and fishermen are common in Northern Europe, in the forest-steppe and forest zones of Eastern Europe and Siberia. The basis of the economy was hunting with a bow, combined with various forms of fishing. The population here was more sparse than in the agricultural zone. Typical are semi-dugouts, temporary camps with huts, round-bottomed and pointed-bottomed clay vessels (cultures with pit-comb ceramics in Eastern Europe, the Kelteminar culture in Central Asia and Kazakhstan, Neolithic cultures of the Ob basin, Yakutia and etc.).
A striking and expressive example of Neolithic culture is the culture of Tripoli, widespread in the 4th-3rd millennia BC. in the south of the European part of Russia and Ukraine and in a number of Balkan countries.
The end of the Trypillian culture dates back to the Chalcolithic (Copper Age) and Bronze Ages. Trypillian settlements of farmers were most often located along river banks. Houses made of clay and wood, rectangular in plan, were probably covered with ornamental paintings on the inside. Models of dwellings and small female figurines were found in the settlements. But the creativity of the Trypillians in decorating ceramics developed especially richly and widely. In terms of variety of forms and ornaments, Trypillian ceramics are not inferior to either Egyptian or Western Asian ones. Trypillian vessels were made of bright yellow or orange clay; the body of the vessel is covered with a variety of geometric patterns, but almost always consisting of spiral lines, painted in red, black, brown, and white colors.
6. Neolithic art. Sculpture. Decorative and applied arts. Megalithic architecture.
Small sculptures made of stone, bone, horn, and clay are becoming widespread. The animal figures are real, although they are interpreted in a general way. The images of female figures are simplified and schematic, sometimes covered with ornaments reproducing patterns on clothing. The development of decorative art is especially characteristic of the Neolithic; Almost everywhere we see the desire to decorate things that people use every day.
Most of all, ornamented pottery has reached us. In the forms of Neolithic vessels, and especially in the method and variety of their decoration, one region differed from another. One can trace the development of ornamentation from the simplest patterns on vessels of the pit-comb type (Eastern Europe) to the superbly made and richly painted vessels of Egypt or Tripoli.
ART
Neolithic rock art was discovered not only in Western and Central Asia and Europe, but also in more southern regions of the globe, for example, in some areas of Africa (Southern Rhodesia, Sahara), in Spain. In this painting and rock art, for the first time in primitive art In art there is a desire for grace. To be convinced of this, just look at the image of a woman collecting wild honey (Arana, Spain). Unlike the mighty “Venuses” of the Paleolithic, here a young female body, graceful and captivating, is depicted in paint on the stone.
SCULPTURE
The first examples of Neolithic sculpture are associated with the funerary cult and are symbolic in nature. Numerous human and animal skulls, decorated with mother-of-pearl inlays and covered with a layer of clay painted with red ocher, were discovered in the ancient settlements of Jericho and Catal-Huyuk (Anatolia, Turkey).
These are nude figures of women (sometimes pregnant women) with exaggerated breasts and hips. Other “sculptures” represent the moment of childbirth, with the figure placed on a high seat flanked by zoomorphic figures. Another type of sculpture represents a mother with a baby in her arms. The mother is depicted with curvaceous hips and breasts and a sketchy head with small slit-like eyes on her face. This type of figure was discovered in the site of Hacilar (western Turkey).
Decorative and applied arts.
Ceramics was also of great importance in the development in man of that unconscious feeling, which later came to be called aesthetic: decorating the vessels he made with whimsical patterns, man gradually improved the art of ornament, marked by increasing geometric harmony, the rhythm of colors and lines born of his creative inspiration.
The first ceramic vessels were made from clay without the use of a potter's wheel and imitated the shapes of leather bellows, pumpkin calabashes or baskets, which served as models for the first decorative patterns. At this stage, geometric ornamental motifs also appeared, such as jagged, comb patterns, zigzags, lines, etc., combined with schematic drawings originating from zoomorphic images. To emboss the clay surface, they resorted to a variety of techniques, using sea shells (cardiac ceramics), spatulas or piercing objects. Another technique was to excavate soft clay and inlay another material (such as white paste), and in this way create an impressive decorative color effect.
Megalithic architecture.
During the Neolithic era, megalithic and pile buildings appeared. Megalith is a Greek word consisting of two parts: mega - large, and lithos - stone. They appear at the end of an era and are associated with the development of religious ideas, the emergence of the cult of ancestors and nature, that is, with the spiritual needs of society. Grandiose, simple-shaped structures made of stone were erected by the labor of the entire primitive community and were an expression of the unity of the clan and its power. These were quadrangular buildings made of slabs (dolmens), vertical pillars, sometimes decorated with reliefs (menhirs, which include the “stone women” of southern Russia), and pillars placed around a sacrificial stone (cromlechs).
Menhir is a megalithic monument not associated with a funeral ritual, representing a single stone vertically fixed in the ground; its specific purpose has not yet been clarified, although it is often associated with religious practices, for example, with the cult of the Sun. Sometimes menhirs form parallel rows or circles, the so-called cromlechs.
Megalithic structures are the earliest architectural monuments of the past preserved in the West. They are found throughout Europe, the oldest of them date back to the mid-5th millennium BC, and their heyday began in the 3rd millennium BC, at the turn of the Bronze Age. We are talking about monumental structures, which in their simplest form are large stones with a base fixed in the ground.
7. Monuments of primitive art on the territory of Russia.
The Paleolithic, after the retreat of the glacier, is followed by the Mesolithic, and after them the Neolithic.
The most important monuments of Paleolithic art are cave images [caves in Spain (Altamira, etc.), in southern France (Lascaux, Montespan, etc.), in the Russian Federation - Kapova Cave], where figures of large animals, full of life and movement, predominate, which were the main objects of hunting (bison, horses, deer, mammoths, predatory animals, etc.). Less common are images of people and creatures that combine the characteristics of humans and animals, handprints, and schematic signs, partially decipherable as reproductions of dwellings and hunting traps. Cave images were made with black, red, brown and yellow mineral paints, less often in the form of bas-reliefs, often based on the resemblance of natural convexities of the stone to the figure of an animal. In addition, in the late Paleolithic, works of round sculpture depicting people and animals appeared (including clay figurines of women - the so-called Aurignacian-Solutrean “Venuses” associated with the cult of “progenitors”), as well as the first examples of artistic carving (engraving on bones and stone).
Kapova Cave is located on the Belaya River in the Shulgan-Tash Nature Reserve in the Burzyansky District of the Republic of Bashkortostan.
The cave is famous for the cave paintings of prehistoric man of the Paleolithic period, dating from the late Solutrean to the Middle Magdalenian. The drawings are on a smooth wall at the far end of the Chaos Hall on the first floor.
The drawings were discovered in 1959 by the zoologist of the reserve A.V. Ryumin. In the research of ancient painting, a major role was played by the Institute of Archeology of the USSR Academy of Sciences (primarily O.N. Bader and V.E. Shchelinsky), which identified more than 50 drawings, in recent decades - by the All-Russian Geological Institute and the Russian Geographical Society represented by Yu.S. Lyakhnitsky, thanks to whose research 173 drawings or their relics - colorful spots - have now been described. The drawings are made mainly with ocher - a natural pigment based on animal fat, their age is about 18 thousand years, mammoths, horses and other animals, anthropomorphic figures are depicted. There are rare charcoal images. The cave contains images of not only animals. Thus, in the upper and middle tiers, scientists found images of huts, triangles, stairs, and oblique lines. The most ancient drawings are in the upper tier. They were drawn in the early Paleolithic era, when Cro-Magnons lived on the planet. On the lower tier of the Kapova Cave there are later images of the end of the Ice Age
8. Canon in the art of Ancient Egypt
In ancient Egyptian painting, the method of depicting the human figure was not focused on reproducing real forms: it was based on a certain scheme, a canon. The artist was required to be able to show the “essence” of earthly life, thereby making it the property of eternity. Therefore, artists created within the framework of a strict canon, which remained unchanged for centuries.
In the images of men and women, the individual traits of specific people were excluded; they represented certain types, shown invariably in the color of their years. Body shapes look deliberately simplified and schematized.
An important role is played by the stylized contour line, the place inside which belonged to the coloring (male figures were usually indicated with red ocher, female figures with yellow). The figure was depicted in profile, but the body (torso and shoulders), as well as the eyes, were shown frontally.
The proportional construction of the human figure also followed a certain canon - a set of rules, according to which the figure was divided into 18 parts. According to some studies, the module was the size of the heel or the clenched fist.
The idea of Eternity, the belief in the possibility of eternal existence in the other world, formed one of the most important artistic qualities of the architecture and art of Ancient Egypt - their monumentality. It was achieved, first of all, by the scale of the works of architecture and sculpture - the gigantic size of the pyramids of the pharaohs, the massiveness of the pylons and colonnades of temples, the colossal size of stone statues, which in itself ensured their durability.
9. Stylistics of fine art of Ancient Egypt
Architecture
A classic example of this kind of structure are the pyramids of the pharaohs of the 4th dynasty (27th century BC) Cheops, Khafre and Mikerin (Greek version of their names). Their refined form, based on the proportions of the “golden section”, was extremely laconic and endlessly expressive. Two elements determined the patterns of form: the base, square in plan, and the convergence of the sides at one point, just as all Egyptian life converged and became focused in the deified pharaoh. The pyramidal design, ingenious in its simplicity, carried an artistic generalization of the very essence of Egyptian society, subordinate to the unlimited power of the pharaoh.
A characteristic feature of the pyramids as architectural considerations was the relationship between mass and space: the burial chamber where the sarcophagus with the mummy stood was very small, and long and narrow corridors led to it. The spatial element has been kept to a minimum.
The mass of the entire pyramid reigned supreme, while the pyramid itself was the final part of a huge spatial ensemble: on the banks of the Nile there was a small lower mortuary temple, from which there was a long covered corridor. Rising along the slope of the Libyan plateau, it led to the upper mortuary temple, located at the foot of the pyramid. The ensemble of Pharaoh Khafre had a giant sphinx, whom the Egyptians called “the father of fear.” It is believed that this was an image of Khafre in lion form (the head of a man and the body of a lion).
Sculpture
A distinctive feature of Egyptian fine art is its canonicity. The formed characteristic features of pictorial forms and compositional solutions become mandatory for all subsequent works of a certain genre, such as portrait sculpture, relief, painting. With all this, Egyptian art is also undergoing some evolution, because true artistic creativity cannot help but respond to the changes that are taking place in the spiritual culture of society. Therefore, we will consider a very limited range of works related to sculptural statues, reliefs and paintings, selecting those examples that most clearly reflected the main points in the development of Egyptian art.
In the Old Kingdom, strictly defined types of statues were developed: standing with the left leg extended and arms lowered, pressed to the body (statue of Mikerin with goddesses, statue of Ranofer); seated, with her hands placed on her knees (statue of Rahotep and his wife Nofret, statue of the royal scribe Kaya).
All are characterized by the following artistic techniques: the figures are constructed with strict observance of frontality and symmetry; the head is set straight and the gaze is directed forward; the figures are inextricably linked with the block from which they are carved, which is emphasized by the preservation of part of this block as a background; the statues were painted: the body of male figures was reddish-brown, female figures were yellow, hair was black, clothes were white.
The main character is solemn monumentality and strict calm.
Reliefs and paintings
1. Line-by-line placement of plot scenes (dividing the plane with horizontal belts).
2. Compositional organization of scenes (within belts) based on orderliness. This principle appears most clearly in the so-called. procession motifs, where the figures move one after another, at regular intervals, with repeated gestures.
3.Different scale of figures. Since the pharaoh was the main character in each composition, he, as well as the gods, was depicted in larger sizes than all other figures.
4. The image of a person is the principle of spreading a figure on a plane, when the head and legs are depicted in profile, and the torso and eye are depicted in front. The clearest, most clearly readable aspects were chosen, organically connected by a generalizing type silhouette and correlated with a two-dimensional plane.
5.Image of objects from different points of view using their vertical arrangement: what is further away is depicted on the plane above.
6.Unity of images and hieroglyphic inscriptions.
10. Stylistics of architecture of Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egypt, which laid the foundation for architecture, was a country devoid of scaffolding. There were as few trees as in other oases of the African desert, the main vegetation being palm trees, which produce poor quality wood, and reeds. All this largely determined that the main building materials were unfired raw brick and stone, mainly limestone mined in the Nile Valley, as well as sandstone and granite. Stone was used mainly for tombs and burials, while brick was used to build palaces, fortresses, buildings in the vicinity of temples and cities, as well as auxiliary structures for temples. Ancient Egyptian houses were built from mud mined from the Nile. It was left in the sun to dry and become suitable for construction.
Many Egyptian cities have not survived to this day, as they were located in the flood zone of the Nile, the level of which rose every millennium, as a result, many cities were flooded, or the mud used for construction became fertilizer for peasant fields. New cities were built on the site of old ones, which is why ancient settlements were not preserved. However, the arid climate of Ancient Egypt preserved some buildings made of raw brick - the village of Deir el-Medina, Kahun, a city that flourished in the Middle Kingdom (modern El-Lahun), fortifications in Buhen and Mirgissa. But the fact that many temples and structures have survived to this day is a consequence of the fact that they were at a height unattainable for the Nile floods and were built of stone.
The basic understanding of ancient Egyptian architecture is based on the study of religious monuments, the best preserved structures. Judging by some of the surviving columns of the temple at Karnak, the Egyptians only turned over the beds and vertical seams before laying the stone; The front surface of the stones was hewn after the construction of the building was completed. This technique was later used by the Greeks. The stones were laid without mortar and without any artificial connections. In the Theban era, apparently, metal fasteners were not used at all, and only occasionally were dovetail-shaped wooden staples used to connect stones together (Medinet Abu, Abydos) or to fasten cracked monoliths (Luxor Obelisk)
The outer and inner walls, as well as the columns and piers, were covered with hieroglyphic and illustrated frescoes and carvings painted in different colors. The motifs for decorating Egyptian buildings are symbolic, such as the scarab, the sacred beetle, or the solar disk, symbolizing the sun god Ra. Also often found are palm leaves, thickets of papyrus, and lotus flowers. Hieroglyphs were used not only for decorative purposes, but also to preserve historical events, wars that were fought, gods that were worshiped, the life of the ancient Egyptians, the life and death of the pharaohs who ruled the ancient state.
11. Stylistics of Egyptian art of the Ancient Kingdom
In the fine arts of the Middle Kingdom, realistic tendencies intensified. In the wall paintings of the tombs of the nomarchs, the images acquire greater compositional freedom, attempts to convey volume appear in them, and the color scheme is enriched. The images of minor everyday scenes, as well as plants, animals and birds, are distinguished by their special poetic freshness and spontaneity. The most famous works of this time include images of scenes of fishing and hunting in the Nile thickets (paintings of the tomb of Khnumhotep, late 20th century BC). Fish is caught with a spear, birds are hunted with a boomerang and a net. A wild cat hides on a papyrus stalk that bends under its weight, a flock of birds with bright plumage takes refuge in the openwork foliage of trees, among them a handsome hoopoe, orange, with black and white wings, stands out.
Starting from the reign of Senusret I, the technique of in-depth relief became more widespread (the tomb of Sarenput I). Reliefs begin to decorate sarcophagi and other objects of funerary cult. One of the most exquisite examples of in-depth relief is the relief of the sarcophagus of the princess and priestess Kawit (Egyptian Museum, Cairo). One of the scenes depicts the process of milking a cow; in the adjacent picture, the priestess tastes the milk, while the maid dresses her mistress.
The tendency towards individualization of the image is most clearly manifested in the sculptural portrait. Statues of pharaohs, while maintaining the traditional canons of composition, clearly record the individual age and physical characteristics of the model, and sometimes character traits (statue of Pharaoh Senusret III, statue of Pharaoh Amenemhet III). Sculptures appear depicting various scenes from the life of the pharaoh, as for example in some of the statues of Senusret III (Egyptian Museum, Cairo). Sculptures called “sphinxes” are becoming widespread - the head of a pharaoh with the body of a lying lion (the sphinx of Pharaoh Amenemhet III). During the Middle Kingdom, the so-called “small” sculpture became extremely widespread - small sculptures made of wood depicting servants performing various types of household work: bakers, brewers, plowmen, women carrying baskets or doing housework.
Under Senusret III, court jewelry flourished. Its magnificent examples were discovered in the burial of the pharaoh's daughter, Sithathor. A rectangular ebony jewelry box inlaid with ivory and pink carnelian contained a bronze mirror decorated with gold, obsidian and gold incense vessels, and a silver saucer. The princess's headdress in the form of a golden hoop with a uraeus (an image of a sacred cobra), a belt made of golden shells and other jewelry were also found in the tomb. Of the many jewelry items dating back to this era, the most exquisite is the so-called pectoral - a breast decoration in the form of a rectangular, slightly beveled plate, decorated with semi-precious stones and images of various deities (often a scarab beetle was depicted on the pectoral - a symbol of the sun and the resurrection from the dead ). The pectoral was one of the obligatory objects of the funeral cult; it was placed on the chest of the deceased. An undoubted masterpiece of jewelry art is the pectoral of Senusret III, carved from gold leaf and decorated with turquoise, lapis lazuli and carnelian.
12. Achievements of ancient Greek plastic arts
Greece Ancient (Horseman of Rampen)
Rampen Rider
Ancient Greek sculpture is a section of the fine arts of Ancient Greece; limestone, marble, bronze, terracotta sculpture; covers the period from the 7th century BC. to 1st century BC Ancient Greek sculpture left a deep mark on the history of fine arts and is recognized as one of the pinnacles of ancient culture. The first monuments of ancient Greek sculpture date back to the geometric style of the 8th century BC. Small sculptures of geometric style were found during excavations in Athens, Olympia, and Boeotia. 7-6 centuries BC belongs to the archaic period of ancient Greek sculpture, it includes stages: early archaic (about 650-580 BC), high archaic (580-530 BC), late archaic (530-480 BC) .e.). The first monumental sculptures of Ancient Greece are characterized by the influence of ancient Eastern sculpture. According to legend, the first creator of sculptures was the master Daedalus, after whom early archaic steel was called Daedalian. The circle of “Daedalian” sculpture includes the statue of Artemis of Delos, a female statue of Cretan work, kept in the Louvre (“Lady of Auxerres”). Mid 7th century BC the first kouroi and the first sculptural temple decoration are dated - reliefs and statues from Prinia (Crete).
Development of ancient Greek sculpture
Subsequently, sculptural decoration filled the fields allocated in the temple by its design: pediments and metopes in the Doric temple, a continuous frieze (zophorus) in the Ionic temple. The earliest pediment compositions were made on the Athenian Acropolis and in the Temple of Artemis in Kerkyra (Corfu). Funerary, dedicatory, and cult statues in the archaic period were represented by kouros and kora. Archaic reliefs decorated the bases of statues, pediments, temple metopes, and tombstones. Later, reliefs in the pediments were replaced by round sculpture. Monuments of archaic round sculpture are the head of Hera, found near her temple in Olympia, the statues of Cleobis and Biton from Delphi, Moschophorus (“Taurus Bearer”) from the Athenian Acropolis, Hera of Samos. To depict a flying or running figure in archaic art, the conventional scheme of “kneeling running” was used. In archaic sculpture, a number of conventions were adopted, for example, the “archaic smile” on faces.
Ancient Greece (funerary urn)
Funeral urn
In the classical period of ancient Greek sculpture (5-4 centuries BC), stages are distinguished: early classics or “strict style” (490-450 BC), high classics (450-420 BC). ), “rich style” (420-390 BC), late classic (390-320 BC). In the classical period, sculptors created reliefs and statues of gods and heroes to decorate temples, as well as secular images - sculptures of Olympic winners and statesmen. At this time, movement was discovered in sculpture; sculptors learned to convey the moment of active action using gestures and poses. The sculptors Myron, Phidias, Polyctetes, each in their own way, updated the art of sculpture and brought it closer to reality. Their ideal was the perfect image of a person whose face cannot be touched by any emotion.
Archaic (Zeus mask)
Zeus mask
The sculptural decoration of the Temple of Athena Aphaia on the island of Aegina was created at the junction of the archaic and classical periods. The sculptures of the western pediment date back to the time of the founding of the temple (510-500 BC), the sculptures of the pediment to the Early Classic (490-480 BC). The main monument of the Early Classics are the pediments and metopes of the Temple of Zeus at Olympia (about 468-456 BC). The early classics include the so-called “Throne of Ludovisi”, decorated with reliefs, as well as original bronze sculptures: “The Delphic Charioteer”, a statue of Poseidon from Cape Artemisium. The largest sculptors of the early classics were Pythagoras of Rhegium, Kalamis, Myron. Their creativity can be judged from written sources and later copies of their works.
High classics are represented by the names of Phidias and Polykleitos. The flourishing of classical sculpture is associated with the decoration of the Parthenon on the Athenian Acropolis - pediments, metopes, zophoros (447-432 BC). The unpreserved chrysoelephantine statues of Athena Parthenos and Olympian Zeus are recognized as the pinnacle of ancient Greek sculpture. The “rich style” is associated with the works of Callimachus, Alkamen, and Agorakritos. Characteristic monuments of the “rich style” are the reliefs of the balustrade of the temple of Nike Apteros on the Athenian Acropolis (circa 410 BC), a number of funerary steles, including the Hegeso stele. The late classics include the decoration of the Temple of Asclepius in Epidaurus (about 400-375 BC), the Temple of Athena Aley in Tegea (about 370-350 BC), the Temple of Artemis in Ephesus (about 355-330 BC), Mausoleum in Halicarnassus (about 350 BC), on the sculptural decoration of which Skopas, Briaxides, Timothy, Leochares worked. The latter is also credited with the statues of Apollo Belvedere and Diana of Versailles. The largest sculptors of the late classics are Praxiteles, Scopas, and Lysippos.
During the Hellenistic era, ancient Greek sculpture was differentiated according to schools. The stage of early Hellenism dates back to 320-250 BC, high Hellenism - to 250-150 BC, late Hellenism - to 150-30 BC. The activities of the followers of Praxiteles are associated with the Alexandrian school. The Pergamon school is represented by statues of the Gauls (“The Dying Gaul” and the “Ludovisi Group” - marble Roman copies from Pergamon bronze originals around 220 BC), the frieze of the Pergamon Altar with the image of Gigantomachy (180-160 BC) . The statue of Nike of Samothrace (about 190 BC) is associated with the Rhodian school; the sculptors Agesander, Polydorus, Afanador (mid-1st century BC) came from it - the creators of the “Laocoon” and the marbles found in 1957 at villa of Emperor Tiberius (14-37 BC) in Sperlonga. The work of the sculptor Apollonius from Athens, the creator of the “Belvedere Torso” and, probably, the statue of the “Fist Fighter” dates back to the same time. At the same time, Apollonius and Tauriscus from Thrall created a group of “Farnese bull”, described by Pliny the Elder and preserved in the later Roman version.
13. The image of a person in ancient Greek art
A striking feature of Greek culture is anthropocentrism. It was in Athens that the philosopher Protagoras proclaimed the famous thesis: “man is the measure of all things.” And although Protagoras was a sophist and meant, first of all, the right of every citizen to defend his point of view, this motto can be considered more broadly, in relation to assessing the role of man in the universe as such.
For the Greeks, man was the personification of all things, the prototype of everything created and being created. That is why the human form, presented in the most beautiful way, became the aesthetic norm for Ancient Greece and was not only the predominant, but almost the only theme of classical art.
The purpose of culture among the ancient Greeks was to promote the harmonious development, spiritual and physical, mental and professional-labor (art, skill) of a person, political and moral-spiritual - a citizen.
It was such a person who was the main object and meaning of culture. If the hero of Egyptian, Mesopotamian or Indian culture is strong in his mystery, supernaturalism, connection with the sky and its elemental forces, then the hero of the culture of Ancient Greece is a real person.
In Ancient Greece, great importance was attached to the shape of the human body, and there was a cult of the body. This is evidenced by surviving works of art - sculpture, vase painting, ceramics, which depict many diverse, often stylized human types. The idea of a person’s beauty was, first of all, associated with his positive moral qualities. The fine man was the personification of courage, intelligent strength and concentration; a handsome young man - a symbol of dexterity, charm and various other virtues characteristic of his age. A person’s external appearance seemed to symbolize a certain level of his inner world. In a world where the harmony of the body was understood as an expression of the harmony of the spirit, ugliness meant a lack of reason, nobility, strength, character, and acted as a negation of positive values.
The ancient Greeks tried, through the human body and thanks to it, to cultivate in themselves correspondingly harmonious spiritual qualities, seeing in it the presence of feeling and mind in their mutual unity and contradiction.
In ancient Greece, various types of art flourished, including spatial ones: architecture, sculpture, vase painting. The main characteristics of the art of Ancient Greece: harmony, balance, orderliness, tranquility, beauty of forms, proportionality. It is deeply humanistic, for it considers man as “the center of the Universe and the measure of all things.” Art is idealistic in nature, as it represents man in his physical and moral perfection. The image of a person in the art of Ancient Greece is a crystal clear concentration of the beautiful spiritual and physical qualities of a real person, cleared of accidents.
14. Order system
The classical architectural forms of Ancient Greece developed most consistently over many centuries, which in the 6th century BC. acquired a clear artistic system of combining architectural and structural details, called an order. In the ancient period, three orders emerged in Greece that are recognized as classical: Doric, Ionic and Corinthian, named after the regions where they were created.
The basic structural design of all orders is a post-and-beam structure, which consists of at least a pair of posts (columns) and a beam (architrave) resting on them. In the simplest version of this structural scheme, the columns are the load-bearing structure, and the architrave is the supporting one. But a single design scheme in no way limited the artistic freedom of the architect. It was in the artistic interpretation of the constructive scheme that the distinctive features of the orders were revealed.
But before we try to reveal the distinctive features of orders, let’s get acquainted with their detail, developing from the bottom up.
The lower load-bearing part - the stylobate - is a solid slab made of flat hewn stones, which serves as the base of the entire building and, in particular, the foot of the columns. The next load-bearing part of the order is the column - one of the defining artistic elements. The columns support the developed supporting part of the order - the entablature. Each order has its own artistic interpretation of the colony and entablature.
Each of these parts consists of smaller elements - architectural details. In the overall composition of any order, as a rule, the decorative richness of details increases from bottom to top. The stylobate, for example, has the simplest construction, most often expressed by three or more ordinary large steps.
The column in its most developed version is composed of three main parts. The lowest one is the base - a support cushion that transfers the load to the stylobate.
From the base, as it were, a fust grows - the trunk of a column, which usually thins upward not in a straight line, but along a patterned curve.
fust - column trunk
This thinning is called entasis. And finally, the capital is the part that crowns the column and carries the load of the entablature. The form and composition of the capital most vividly and figuratively reflects the artistic differences of the Greek orders.
15. Ancient Greek sculpture
(Question 12)
16. Stylistics of art of Ancient Egypt during the New Kingdom period: architecture, sculpture, painting, decorative and applied arts
From the beginning of the New Kingdom, royal tombs were finally separated from mortuary temples. Tombs began to be built in gorges and rocks. They are carefully hidden hiding places. The walls of the premises are painted with scenes relating mainly to the funeral cult.
To establish their divine power, the pharaohs are again carrying out grandiose construction. But instead of a pyramid, the crown of this construction becomes a temple, therefore it was in the monumental temple construction that the character of this time was most fully and clearly reflected. The plans of the overwhelming majority of temples in the first half of the New Kingdom were rectangular and obeyed a single rule: all its main parts were located along the same axis. The main parts of the temple were an open courtyard surrounded by a colonnade - the peristyle, hypostyle hall, sanctuary and storerooms.
The Egyptian temple was supposed to be a copy of the land of Egypt. The blue ceiling, studded with stars, depicted sacred kites, the entire ritual of veneration of the deity in the person of the pharaoh was visible on the walls, and the painting on the floor resembled the waters of the Nile. The facade of the temple was usually facing the Nile, with which the temple was connected by the “path of God” - the road , fenced with alleys of lions, rams or sphinxes and decorated near the entrance to the temple with tall obelisks.
In Thebes, on the right bank of the Nile, two colossal temple ensembles were erected, dedicated to the god Amun. Today they are known by the names of two modern Arab villages - Karnak and Luxor.
At the beginning of the New Kingdom period, the ancient temple of Ipet-sut ("The most chosen of all places") in Karnak turns from a small sanctuary into a national cult center. Each new ruler added new ones to the existing temples, decorating them with statues, and sometimes remodeling the old premises, which is why over the centuries the Karnak complex turned into a kind of stone city with alleys and squares, columns and temples..
Large statues in the open air were organically included in the architectural background of the temples - in the courtyards, in front of the pylons, along the edges of the front roads. They were, as it were, a semantic component in religious buildings. Their strict constructiveness clearly revealed the most canonical executions, dating back to the era of the Old Kingdom. However, the artists’ desire to convey physiognomically specific portrait features is already noticeable in them. Now the hieratic numbness of the statues of old times remains only in a pose to convey the specific appearance of the ruler, while the image itself is spiritualized.
Sculptors began to pay special attention to detail and accurately convey the subtleties and characteristic features of the new costume, covering the surface of the statues with many flowing lines, grooves, conveying the corrugated folds of clothes made of thin linen fabrics and the finely curled curls of lush wigs, fashionable in the era of the New Kingdom. Body shapes now appear through the suit. As a result, a picturesque gradation of three-dimensional plans and a varied play of light and shadow was formed, which was further emphasized by the multicolor painting of the statues.
However, the features of this style were able to develop most freely in small plastics. Here, what was most clearly manifested was something that had no place in the previous art of Egypt: instead of isolation - movement, fragmented folds, play of light and shadow, instead of graphics - picturesqueness, instead of cubicity and angularity - softness, roundness, instead of severity - a feminine melodiousness of lines.
In the wall reliefs, along with compositions in which the victories of the kings and the ritual ceremonies performed by the king were glorified, compositions appeared that told about the genealogy of the pharaohs, their origin from the gods, as well as about the connections of Egypt with other countries
A departure from ancient traditions was also evident in private tombs. This painting reflected the most diverse aspects of the life of nobles. In them one feels that the masters of the New Kingdom have embarked on the path of searching for a more daring and complex image of the surrounding world. The drawings of the figures have become softer and more refined. The raised and bent arms, thrown back heads, rows of curls and folds of clothing of the mourners from the tomb of Vizier Ramses break the motionless symmetry of traditional compositions. Lush hairstyles, clothes, luxury of life betray an attitude to ornament, to line, to the play of light and shadow, which had no place in previous art
The palaces of the pharaoh and the nobility were surrounded by parks and picturesquely located ponds, where there were many waterfowl. The main palace of the pharaoh was a complex of two parts: a ceremonial part and an intimate part with gardens, a palace sanctuary and service premises. Both parts were connected by a suspended covered passage across the road leading to the palace. The main part of the front part was the Wide Hall of Aten with numerous statues of the king. We have reached us with one-of-a-kind floor paintings from the palace, which conveyed the favorite images of pools with lotuses, fish, ducks fluttering in the thickets of papyrus and frolicking calves at that time.
In the reliefs and paintings of the palaces and tombs of Akhetaten, many new subjects and everyday details appeared that had not been encountered before, mainly associated with the chanting of love, harmony, spiritual closeness between the pharaoh and queen and their children. In the arts, a new image of man is being formed: in the images of the king, Nefertiti and those close to him, mercy and goodness, soft beauty and openness of the soul to emotions and feelings are emphasized
While preserving the main canonical techniques, the style of Akhetaton’s reliefs speaks of a desire to break the immobility of tradition from within. The clear contour of the traditional relief is broken, crushed, outlining a protruding profile, a long neck, a strange outline of the figure, and thin legs. Internal movement finds expression in deformation and deliberate movement of lines.
The realism of Amarna art manifested itself with particular force in the round sculpture created by talented sculptors of Theban workshops, brought up in the centuries-old traditions of Theban art, which flourished brightly even before the Amarna period - during the reign of the entire XVIII dynasty.
The best works of the Amarna period are distinguished by their humanity and insight, filled with a genuine breath of life. The material of the sculpture also changed: hard and cold stones were replaced by soft, porous limestone, from which the famous portraits of Nefertiti and Akhenaten were made.
The style of applied art during the short period of the reign of Akhenaten and his first two successors is distinguished by figurative plasticity and very high decorativeness.\
Soon after the death of Akhenaten under Tutankhamun, a reaction occurred. The old nobility and priesthood, having come to an agreement with the new serving nobility, completely restored the previous beliefs and rituals. Young Tutankhamun, under the influence of the priests, returned the capital to Thebes. Subsequent rulers diligently destroyed everything that spoke about the life-giving solar disk and its prophet. In the XIV – XI centuries. BC e. art was designed to suppress, amaze with its grandeur, and glorify the power of the great Egyptian power. The temples of Ramses II (the so-called Ramessey) and two temples in Abu Simbel, in Nubia, near the second Nile cataracts, are striking in their grandeur.
In many monuments of this period, a deliberate appeal to the traditions of the Old Kingdom is noticeable, caused by the fact that the overwhelming heaviness of forms, massiveness, and emphasized physical power of the figures contributed to the monumentalization of the image.
However, the desire for pomp was not the only feature in the art of the second half of the New Kingdom. Traditions rooted in Amarna art were strong. Even the most traditionally interpreted temple reliefs contain features of the art of the Amarna period: the smoothness of sophisticated silhouettes, soft decorative elaboration of volumes.
The Egyptians had a special love for nature, and especially flowers. During the New Kingdom, this interest in nature increased even more, and entire landscapes began to be reproduced in the paintings of the houses of wealthy Egyptians. Hanging garlands of flowers, flowering trees and bushes were depicted on the walls, the ceilings were painted in the color of the sky with blue paint with flying ducks, doves and hawks, and ponds with blooming lotuses were reproduced on the floors, and even the light ripples of the surface of the water sparkling in the sun were imitated.
Small sculptures and artistic crafts, distinguished by very high craftsmanship, followed the traditions of great art. These include figurines of the priest Amenhotep and the priestess Rannai (kept in the Pushkin State Museum of Art), carved cosmetic spoons in the shape of naked girls, figured vessels for rubbing, household items of the Egyptian nobility (furniture, jewelry). Small household items were decorated with exquisite carvings. In the manufacture of these objects, the artist found a particularly wide field for imagination, not restrained by canons. A slave carrying a jug, a woman collecting papyrus in a swamp, a bather with a caught duck - these are some of the motifs with which the handles of spoons were decorated.
The handles of bronze mirrors are decorated either with the heads of deities: Hathor - the goddess of love, Ahautia - the patron saint of women, his brother Bes - the patron of blush and decorative cosmetics in general, or simply with a naked female figure, a papyrus or lotus flower. The superbly polished disk of these hand-made bronze mirrors reflected the dark faces of Egyptian women no worse than our glass mirrors. All objects of this time bear the stamp of decorativeness, characteristic of both “great” art and small plastic art.
Let us recall that in the history of Ancient Egypt, six major periods are distinguished without taking into account transitional eras:
Predynastic period – 5 thousand BC – turn of the 3rd millennium BC
Early Kingdom – 3000 BC – 28th century BC.
Ancient Kingdom – 28th century. BC. – 23rd century BC.
Middle Kingdom - 21st century. BC. – 18th century BC.
New Kingdom - 1580-1085 BC.
Late period – 1085 BC – 332 BC
All periods of Egyptian art are characterized by a remarkable unity of style, which is explained by various factors: unique natural conditions, the exceptional importance of religion and priesthood, the pharaoh and his court, the primacy of architecture, the spirit of conservatism.
The predominant importance of stone in Egyptian art, especially in architecture, is well known. The Egyptians, who from time immemorial attached great importance to the funeral cult, which contained the idea of eternity, widely used this natural material. The most interesting use of stone was in two branches of applied art of ancient Egypt: in architectural decoration and in such products as palettes for rubbing paints and stone vessels.
The most interesting palettes are made in the shape of animals: elephant, hippopotamus, antelope, fish, turtle. Later, ceremonial palntki appeared in the form of a shield, possibly for votive purposes; they depicted hunting or war scenes. Unlike the first ones, they were equipped with a cup for diluting paint and decorated with relief decoration over the entire surface.
Stone vessels, one of the highest artistic achievements of the Egyptians, appear already in the Neolithic era (Merimde culture). But from the era of the New Kingdom, magnificent alabaster vessels discovered in the tomb of Tutankhamun have been preserved.
The high achievements of the Egyptians in the field of architectural decoration are well known. The walls of temples were often decorated with reliefs. Let us note an interesting detail: the decor of the external walls was dedicated to the glorification of the power of the pharaoh and depicted hunting and military scenes; the internal walls were intended for scenes of a cult nature. Reliefs covered the entire surface of the walls. \
Columns appear in the stone architecture of the Old Kingdom at Saqqara, where we know the wall-recessed columns of the Northern House, the capitals of which are shaped like papyrus flowers.
Stone carving was used not only in temples, but also in tombs, sometimes in the form of architectural elements.
PAINTING
Decorative painting was used to decorate temples, palaces, residential buildings and tombs. Our idea of Egyptian painting is based on extremely incomplete data, since the vast majority of it has been lost, so that almost nothing has survived from the painting of temples, only a few samples from palaces and residential buildings have reached us, and only the painting of tombs has survived in fairly large quantities .
This painting used the following paints: black (coal pigment), white (based on gypsum and lime), gray (a mixture of white and black), blue (calcium frit and copper silicate), green (crushed malachite and frit similar to blue), brown (ochre), red (ochre), pink (a mixture of white and red), yellow (yellow ocher and orpiment).
The subjects of Egyptian painting in the Middle and New Kingdoms were very diverse; among them there are images of artisans who took part in the creation of the structure (the image of cabinetmakers and jewelers in the tomb of Rekhmir).
The ceilings of tombs are usually decorated with carefully executed geometric motifs and floral friezes. The main motifs used in painting are straight and broken lines; checkerboard pattern; sockets; grids; spirals; cords; Greek ornament; plant elements; hieroglyphs. .
In conclusion, it should be noted the appearance of painting as book miniatures - in the “Book of the Dead”. The drawings illustrate the text, the most famous of them depicts the judgment of Osiris over the dead, the god weighs the soul of the deceased on scales; Subsequently, this plot will often appear on the portals of Romanesque and Gothic cathedrals.
CERAMICS
Egyptian ceramics are very diverse and are generally divided into two types: clay and earthenware.
Pottery has been known in Egypt since the beginning of the Neolithic, i.e., from 5 thousand BC; its forms and decor arose in the Predynastic period. Since about 3200, artisans have made their wares on a potter's wheel and then polished the outer surface with pebbles. Later, from the Old Kingdom, products began to be fired in kilns, and then covered with painting. In subsequent eras, pottery was replaced by metal ones and its production was limited to purely utilitarian needs.
Faience products are one of the achievements of Egyptian artistic crafts. Since the time of the First Dynasty, faience beads and small round gaming tables have existed. Blue faience was widely used for lining the interior of Djoser's tomb and for the production of other decorative architectural elements.
In addition to decorative elements of architecture, the Egyptians made a wide variety of products from faience: necklaces, canopic jars, figurines for burials, vessels for incense, goblets and bowls.
GLASS
The oldest glass objects are beads, created before the First Dynasty. The heyday of art glass production occurred during the New Kingdom during the 18th Dynasty. This era left us numerous objects: bowls, bottles, beads, pipes, vases, vessels for incense, earrings, rings, playing pawns, amulets, material for inlays and overlays imitating semi-precious stones, in particular jasper and lapis lazuli.
The Egyptians also knew glass mosaics. Multi-colored glass plates were heated until they fused, and then stretched to produce thin and very long strips, often depicting simply hieroglyphs. These works were distinguished by amazing care in their execution, but at the same time, the Egyptians never sought to achieve the transparency of glass.
main color – blue, for decoration – green, yellow, red, white, black
JEWELRY MAKING
The period of the Middle Kingdom was a time of true flowering of jewelry. It is difficult to choose the best from the many tiaras, headpieces, necklaces, bracelets and rings.
Royal breast ornaments are typical works of Egyptian art. They are marked by a clear influence of architecture. Their decor tells about the victories of the pharaoh and looks like a historical bas-relief made using jewelry technology. All chest decorations are usually bright and colorful
METALS
Along with precious metals, the Egyptians processed copper and bronze. In the field of decorative art, we know copper vessels, basins and jugs from the era of the Old Kingdom; as well as bronze ceremonial axes, vessels and stands for them, lamps, cosmetic tweezers. Among toilet items, a prominent place belongs to mirrors, the bronze handles of which are made in the form of a column or a figurine of a standing girl. The remarkable art of Egyptian bronze makers is also demonstrated by figurines of sitting and lying cats.
TREE
Wooden products include mainly furniture, and also some household items.
The oldest surviving examples of furniture belong to the era of the Old Kingdom. This is a box, the legs of which imitate a standing bull, as well as a carved chair, stretcher and bed.
From the Middle Kingdom, a casket for the jewels of Princess Sit-Hathor has been preserved, made of ebony and inlaid with ivory (which was often used to decorate wooden products, as well as to create various carved toiletries), gold and faience; its appearance was likened to architectural forms.
The new kingdom left us many items from Tutankhamun's furniture: armchairs, chairs, beds, stools, tripods, folding chairs, caskets, gambling tables. This furniture captivates with its multicoloredness, but it is very far from the noble simplicity of the furniture of Cheops’ mother.
All these works give us basic information about Egyptian furniture, supplemented by paintings and sculptures. Sycamore and acacia were used from local wood species, and cedar, cypress, and ebony from imported ones.
FABRICS
Thanks to its dry climate, more fabrics have survived from Ancient Egypt than from all ancient civilizations combined. The main textile raw material was flax; wool and hemp were used very rarely.
The most interesting samples of fabrics were found in the tomb of Tutankhamun and represent the remains of seven royal robes, some of them with embroidery.
Floral and animated patterns predominated in fabric patterns; the use of hieroglyphs, royal cartouches and symbolic motifs was also common.
18.Canon in the art of the Ancient East
The art of Ancient Egypt developed with the first years of the birth of Ancient Egypt, bringing with it more and more new manifestations and features. The art and culture of Ancient Egypt were among the most advanced among the arts of various peoples of the Ancient East.
The Egyptian people were the first in the world to create monumental stone architecture; a sculptural portrait remarkable for its realistic truthfulness; beautiful handicrafts.
The artistic style of ancient Egyptian art changed relatively little over the centuries. The basis of this style was the original architecture of emphatically geometric forms, geometrization and canonization of the simplest techniques of depiction on a plane.
A striking feature of the art of Ancient Egypt was devotion to the traditions of their ancestors and the observance of certain canons. The reason for this was that religious views attributed a sacred meaning to the artistic appearance of the first, most ancient monuments of Egyptian art. Since throughout the subsequent history of Ancient Egypt, the overwhelming majority of art monuments also had a religious and cult purpose, the creators of these monuments were obliged to follow the established canons. Therefore, in the art of Egypt, a number of conventions were preserved, often going back to primitive art and then consolidated in patterns that became canonical. Examples of this are images of objects and animals that are invisible to neither the viewer nor the artist, but which can definitely be present in a given scene (for example, fish and crocodiles under water); depicting an object using a schematic listing of its parts (tree foliage in the form of many conventionally arranged leaves or bird plumage in the form of individual feathers); a combination in the same scene of images of objects taken from different angles (for example, a bird was depicted in profile, with its tail on top; a human figure had a head in profile, an eye in front, shoulders and arms in front, and legs in profile). The creation of canons meant the formation of a strict and developed system of artistic views. The need to follow the canons led to the creation of written guidelines for artists. It is known about the existence of “Prescriptions for wall painting and the canon of proportions,” which are mentioned in the list of books in the library of the temple at Edfu, as well as the presence of similar manuals for sculptors. Compliance with the canons also determined the technical features of the work of Egyptian craftsmen, who early used a grid to accurately transfer the desired sample onto the wall. However, later adherence to the canons played a conservative, inhibiting role, preventing the development of realistic tendencies.
The Egyptians sincerely believed in the magical power of art, in its mystical purpose, therefore they created a strict and rational system of means of artistic expression that conveyed the sacred, timeless meaning of the ritual and human burial. The architectural appearance of Ancient Egypt is represented by pyramids. Nowhere in the world have such grandiose tombs been built for rulers deified during life and after death. The greatness of the pyramids was highly valued by the Egyptians. The names of their creators carved on the stones were preserved for posterity.
The pyramids that proudly rose on the western bank of the Nile (now the Giza plateau near Cairo) were considered one of the seven wonders of the world in the ancient world.
Human figures, embodied in Egyptian sculptures, appear before us in motionless, majestic poses. These are people standing or sitting with their left leg extended forward, with their arms pressed to their torso or folded on their chest.
The relief, like the sculpture, was created in accordance with the clear religious meaning of the funeral cult. According to ancient Egyptian ideas, a person consisted of several entities (in modern terms, souls), the reunification of which ensured eternal life. Therefore, in relief, drawing or sculpture, they depicted not what they saw, but what was considered most suitable for a happy and eternal afterlife.
19.image of man in the art of the Ancient East
At the beginning of the 3rd millennium BC, when the image of a person appears in art, we also see on seals images of a person both in scenes of a clearly cult nature - solemn processions, rituals performed in front of the temple - and in everyday life: milking cows, sculpting pots, weaving, etc.
However, it is likely that these images are somehow connected with the cult. Mythological scenes are still rare. The figures on the seal impressions are convex, tactile, three-dimensional, and beautifully modeled. The technique of drilling with a buterol - a rapidly rotating tool with a ball at the end - is readily used. The images are done very carefully.
The images on some cult vessels, which survived in much smaller quantities, are stylistically close to them.
An excellent example of the plastic arts of ancient Mesopotamia, which allows us to judge the characteristic features of the art of this time, is a vessel found in Uruko.
On a cult vessel from Uruk, which shows us a festive procession with gifts, we clearly see these image features characteristic of ancient Eastern art: figures with the torso turned in front, face in profile, with an eye in front, legs in profile; the animals are presented entirely in profile, the river is rendered in wavy lines. The narrative nature of the image, alien to the art of the late Neolithic, is also introduced: the vessel is divided by empty stripes into three registers (all scenes should be read from bottom to top): in the lower register - rams and lambs following each other, in the second - naked figures of male donors with vessels and bowls in the hands, in the third - offering gifts to the goddess.
Each section may have reflected a separate stage of the rite, and the topmost one represented the final moment of the procession.
20. Sculpture from the classical period of Ancient Greece .
The style of Greek classics combines sensual spontaneity and rationality.
“We love beauty without whimsicality and wisdom without effeminacy,” said Pericles. The Greeks valued rationality, balance and moderation, but at the same time they recognized the power of passions and sensual joys.
When we now say “ancient art,” we imagine museum halls filled with statues and the walls hung with fragments of reliefs. But then everything looked different. Although the Greeks had special buildings for storing paintings (pinakotheks), the vast majority of works of art did not lead a museum lifestyle. The statues stood in the open air, illuminated by the sun, near temples, in squares, on the seashore; processions and festivals and sports games took place near them. As in the archaic era, the sculpture became colorful. The world of art was a living, bright world, but more perfect.
A favorite set of motives is sports competitions. Miron. Discus thrower. Roman copy, circa 460 BC. Themes of hand-to-hand combat, equestrian competitions, running competitions, and discus throwing taught sculptors to depict the human body in dynamics. Now complex poses, bold angles, and sweeping gestures appear. The brightest innovator was the Attic sculptor Myron. This is his famous “Discobolus”. The athlete bent over and swung before throwing, a second - and the disc will fly, the athlete will straighten up. But for that second his body froze in a very difficult, but balanced position.
In the art of the ancient Greeks at this stage, courageous images predominated, but, fortunately, a beautiful relief depicting Aphrodite emerging from the sea was preserved - a sculptural triptych, the upper part of which was broken off.
Birth of Aphrodite. Relief gray V century BC.
In the central part, the goddess of beauty and love, “foam-born,” rises from the waves, supported by two nymphs who chastely protect her with a light veil. It is visible from the waist up. Her body and nymphs are visible through transparent chitons, the folds of clothes cascade like streams of water, like music. On the side parts of the triptych there are two female figures: one nude, playing the flute; the other, wrapped in a veil, lights a sacrificial candle. The first is a hetaera, the second is a wife, the keeper of the hearth, like two faces of femininity, both under the patronage of Aphrodite.
The Greeks' admiration for the beauty and wise structure of the living body was great. Body language was also the language of the soul. The Greeks mastered the art of conveying “typical” psychology; they expressed a rich range of mental movements based on generalized human types. It is no coincidence that portraiture in Ancient Greece was relatively poorly developed.
Ephebe from Antikythera. c.340 BC Athens Polykleitos. Doryphoros. mid-5th century BC.
Leohar. Apollo Belvedere. Roman copy. IV century BC. For a long time, this sculpture was assessed as the pinnacle of ancient art; the “Belvedere idol” was synonymous with aesthetic perfection. As often happens, the high praise over time caused the opposite reaction. They began to find her pompous and mannered. Meanwhile, Apollo Belvedere is a truly outstanding work in its plastic merits; the figure and gait of the ruler of the muses combines strength and grace, energy and lightness, walking on the ground, he
at the same time it hovers above the ground. To achieve such an effect, the sculptor's sophisticated skill was needed; the only trouble is that the calculation for the effect is too obvious. Apollo Leochara seems to invite one to admire his beauty, and even in the era of late classics, virtuoso performance was highly valued.
21. Stylistics of Hellenistic art
The best works of Hellenistic art were created from the end of the 4th century BC. until the middle of the 2nd century BC, during the heyday of the Hellenistic states and the emergence of a number of independent cultural centers.
The architects of Hellenism did not create architectural images similar in depth to the Parthenon, but they surpassed the classical masters in creating huge building complexes. The Hellenic sense of boundless open spaces found vivid expression in the forms of architecture. The grandiose ensembles and majestic high-rise buildings of Hellenism reflected feelings that escaped from the narrow framework of polis balance into the turbulent, disharmonious world of huge monarchies.
Another feature of Hellenistic architecture was the sound of a new theme - tension - in the artistic layout of the buildings of the Hellenistic acropolises, especially noticeable after the majestically calm classical ensembles.
Mosaic
Due to the flourishing of architecture during the Hellenistic era, frescoes and mosaics became widespread and decorated houses and public buildings. Mosaics often decorated not only the walls, but also the floors. In painting and mosaics, Hellenistic masters preferred unusual, exciting, disturbing subjects and themes.
Hellenistic rulers and their nobles, rich people wanted to decorate their palaces, gardens and parks with works of art as similar as possible to those that were considered perfect in the era of classics and the power of Alexander the Great. Decorative sculpture is developing. Having received numerous orders, the masters of the Hellenistic era no longer bothered themselves with searching for new forms, but only sought to make a statue that would seem no worse than the original of Praxiteles or Lysippos, which invariably led to the borrowing of already found forms, that is, to academicism, and statues of Aphrodite appeared, depicting the goddess as coquettishly cutesy or bashful. In the dense greenery of gardens and parks one could see statues of Cupids and Psyche tenderly embracing, centaurs saddled by playful gods of love...
However, in 1820, a statue of Aphrodite, now known as the Venus de Milo, was found on the island of Milos (in the Aegean Sea). Its author was a sculptor named Alexander or Agesend: not all letters in the inscription have been preserved. Everything in this statue is so harmonious and harmonious, the strong, calm and beautiful body embodies the high ideal of the classical era, and the classically beautiful face is full of inner passion to match the Hellenistic era.
The art of portraiture is very common in the Hellenistic world. “Eminent people” are multiplying, having succeeded in the service of the Diadochi rulers or who have risen to the top of society thanks to a more organized exploitation of slave labor than in the former fragmented Hellas: they want to imprint their features for posterity. At the same time, portrait art continued to develop the late classical tradition. Portraits are increasingly individualized, but at the same time, if we are looking at the highest representative of power, then his superiority and the exclusivity of the position he occupies are emphasized.
It was in the Hellenistic world that cameos - relief-carved gems - first appeared. They had no practical use. They were decorated with them, they were admired - and that’s all. However, their creation required rare stones and painstaking work. Only a wealthy society, in its pursuit of brilliance and refined splendor, could afford such luxury, such widespread dissemination of this art. Cameos first appeared precisely in the Hellenistic world and, in all likelihood, in Alexandria, where the Macedonian Ptolemaic dynasty reigned with truly pharaonic pomp.
Small masterpieces, inspired by the genius of Praxiteles, were terracottas - figurines made of baked clay, which reproduce characteristic types snatched from various layers of the population: elegant young women, children, musicians, acrobats, fist fighters, fishermen, chickens, blacks, pygmies, artisans, servants, slaves. This was the cheapest production, since the figurines were made in molds and produced in huge quantities both in Greece itself and in the Greek cities of Asia Minor, in Alexandria, and in the Northern Black Sea region. The first place in terms of their artistic qualities is occupied by terracottas from Tangara in Boeotia, almost entirely dedicated to feminine charm and grace. And there is nothing sweet about them, no deliberate grace. Small, toy-like, female images captivate us with their freshness and most lively spontaneity.
22. Etruscan art: architecture, sculpture, painting, decorative and applied arts. General characteristics.
1. Architecture
The creative spirit of the Etruscans manifested itself in such an applied art as architecture. To build cities and unique buildings, especially temples, naturally, experienced architects and engineers were needed. The surviving fortifications in some Etruscan cities indicate that the Etruscans were able to solve quite complex technical problems. Crypts are most typical for the work of Etruscan architects. They attract attention primarily with their appearance. Many of them are striking in size, for example the tombs from the vast necropolises in the vicinity of Caere and other cities. The Etruscan graves had different structures. The earliest period includes small shaft graves, at the bottom of which a biconical urn containing the ashes of the deceased was placed. This method of burying the dead was known in northern Italy in the pre-Etruscan era. Clay urns were covered with a lid, often in the shape of a helmet. Along with cremation, the dead were buried in ditch-like graves.
Necropolis of Banditach
Domed tomb
The cities of the dead were built by the Etruscans just as carefully as the cities of the living, and perhaps even more carefully. Residential buildings in Etruscan cities were most often lightweight buildings, and vast necropolises, these outstanding creations of Etruscan engineers, were built firmly and massively, to last for centuries, so that they would provide reliable shelter for those who rest in them. The Etruscan tombs in the vicinity of Caere, Tarquinia, Vetulonia and Populonia are unique structures of their kind.
Necropolises were located close to cities and represented a closed complex, a kind of world in itself. The cities of the dead were real doubles and satellites of the world of the living. The royal tombs were not built chaotically one next to the other, the general plan of the necropolis was thought out, it feels the same sense of purpose as in the planning of cities.
Etruscan cemeteries are not only outstanding architectural monuments. The furnishings and utensils have been preserved in the crypts, thanks to which we can become more familiar with the life of the Etruscans and penetrate deeper into their spiritual world.
2. Painting
"Funeral Feast" Fresco. 5th century BC e. Tomb of the Leopards. Tarquinia
The importance of Etruscan crypts for the study of culture is not limited to the technical perfection and originality of the buildings and the uniqueness of the finds found in them. Many graves became a rich source of information about Etruscan painting, one of the most interesting aspects of the art of this people. Etruscan painting is the earliest painting in Italy and, in a sense, a unique source for understanding ancient painting in general. Etruscan funerary frescoes and paintings on terracotta provide an opportunity to study the development of painting in Italy over five to six centuries. The richest Etruscan tombs are real art galleries. Roman painting of the 2nd-1st centuries. BC e. grew up in the rich artistic tradition of the Etruscans.
The most ancient Etruscan tombs decorated with frescoes include the Campana Grotto, located in the vicinity of ancient Vei. This grave of the 6th century BC. e. found in 1842. The frescoes of the "Campana Grotto" undoubtedly indicate the origin of Etruscan wall painting. It can be seen from them that it was still difficult for the artist to depict movement and evenly distribute the details of the picture over the entire area, maintaining proportion between them. The frescoes give the impression of constraint. It is possible that this is a lot
The influence of oriental art, whose images and subjects appear on the frescoes, also contributed. Fairy-tale monsters - sphinxes and wild beasts - are depicted next to a hunting scene, which inspired artists who designed other crypts. Hunting probably played an important role in the life of the Etruscan aristocracy. A more careful analysis reveals not only Eastern, but also Cretan influence. Even this early monument attracts with the bright colors typical of all Etruscan frescoes.
The earliest crypts decorated with frescoes include the “Tomb with Bulls” (second half of the 6th century BC), so named because bulls are depicted twice on its walls. Their stylized contours are applied with simple, even rough strokes. This simplification does not hurt the eyes, despite the fact that the artist did not preserve the proportions of the animals’ bodies, lengthening and narrowing it. The meaning of this image is still unclear. Perhaps the Etruscan artist was influenced by the widespread Mediterranean idea of the bull as a symbol of fertility. If this is really the case, then, apparently, the artist wanted to contrast the frailty of existence, which everyone who enters the crypt cannot help but think about, with the idea of a constantly renewed life.
The desire to depict the dynamics of movement forced Etruscan artists to reproduce not only individual independent scenes, but also a whole complex of events. They divided one event into several paintings, plot-related. This is how a unique style of depicting scenes that sequentially lead the story arose. This style is the Etruscan contribution to the development of the creative artistic method.
3 Sculpture
"Mater-Matuta". Limestone. 5th century BC. Archaeological Museum. Florence
The desire for a realistic depiction of reality found expression not only in Etruscan painting, but also in sculptural works. Among the most typical creations of this kind, images of people are especially interesting. And in this case, artistic creativity was inextricably linked with funeral rites. After all, sculptures most often decorate urns and sarcophagi.
Canopy from Chiusi. 6th century BC e. Archaeological Museum. Florence
The Etruscans have long sought to emphasize human individuality. Remarkable products of Etruscan craftsmen, the so-called anthropomorphic canopies, were found in large quantities in the vicinity of ancient Clusium (some of them date back to the 7th century BC). These are oval urns, stylized to resemble the human body, with handles in the shape of human hands. The urn was closed with a lid depicting the head of the deceased. When making the lids, the Etruscans' ability to convey portrait likeness was demonstrated. Individual products differ from each other no less than the people themselves during life, but the expression on their faces suggests that they are not looking at us from the world of the living. These portraits resemble death masks, which were usually removed from the faces of wealthy Etruscans.
Sarcophagus of the couple from Cerveteri. Terracotta. 6th century BC e. Villa Giulia Museum. Rome
Sculptural images of the dead also decorated urns and sarcophagi in a later period. On the slabs covering the sarcophagus and on the lids of the urns lay figures of men, women and even married couples.
These works are often called the pinnacle of Etruscan portrait art. The creators of sarcophagi are accused of falling into crude realism and even naturalism while trying to emphasize the features of the model. Indeed, Etruscan sculptors cannot be denied the desire to accurately depict reality in any of its forms. In some cases, sculptors emphasized individual facial features by depicting the head as disproportionately large compared to the body. When showing old people, the Etruscans did not hide their wrinkles; fat people did not become slimmer in their sculptural portraits. On the contrary, one gets the impression that the creators of these unique works of art were somewhat caricatured, emphasizing the irregularity in the faces of those depicted.
This is probably the secret of the originality of Etruscan tomb sculptures and the impression they make. They undoubtedly represent a significant phenomenon in Etruscan art. Those features of their works that today seem to us to be an extreme manifestation of realism are close to the traditions of folk art, which has not yet risen to the level of understanding the realistic portrait characteristic of classical Greek and Roman art.
23. Etruscan heritage in the art of Ancient Rome
The significance of Etruscan art, in addition to its own original value, lies primarily in the fact that its artistic forms formed the basis of Roman art. Having conquered the Etruscans, the Romans accepted their achievements and continued what the Etruscans had started in their architecture, sculpture and painting.
The peculiar technical techniques of the Etruscans were the soil on which Roman engineering was formed. The Romans especially often followed the Etruscans in the construction of roads, bridges, and defensive walls. The constructive principles that made themselves known in the architecture of the early republic largely go back to the Etruscan systems. In temple architecture, the Romans took from the Etruscans a high podium, a steep multi-step staircase in front of the entrance, and the blank back side of the building. There is a noticeable repetition of Etruscan forms in Roman tombs. Etruscan sculpture had no less a strong influence than architecture on the Romans. Already in the first years of the republic, the Roman monument - the Capitoline She-wolf - was executed by an Etruscan master. In the formation of the Roman sculptural portrait, one cannot underestimate, along with the Greek, the traditions of Etruscan masters, especially in bronze casting. The specificity of the artistic thinking of the Etruscans, their love for accuracy and detail turned out to be in tune with the Roman manner of perceiving reality, mainly in the genre of portraiture. The widely developed multicolor painting of Etruscan tombs greatly influenced the Romans, causing them to develop frescoes and awakening to life a new, not plastic, but illusory-picturesque practice of seeing the world, which was destined to become dominant in Europe. In this regard, the Etruscans predetermined many features not only of Roman, but also of all later European art
1. Architecture of Assyria
2. Sculpture and painting of Assyria
Art of Assyria- the totality of all objects of art of the ancient state in Northern Mesopotamia (on the territory of modern Iraq) - Assyria, from XXIV-VII BC. e.
Assyria became one of the leading states of Western Asia in the first half
In contrast to the art of Egypt and the art of Mesopotamia of the early period, the art of Assyria of the 1st millennium BC. e. had a more secular purpose, although it was also associated with religion.
Architecture
Architecture was still the leading type of art, but they built mainly palace complexes and fortresses, and not just temples.
Paris leaves in gilt bronze. The colorful decoration of the palace was apparently combined with the skillful introduction of landscaping on the terraces.
Sculpture
Relief predominates in Assyrian plastic art. Round sculpture did not play a big role in the art of Assyria.
From the time of Ashurnasirapal II, a remarkable alabaster statue of Ashurnasirapal II himself has come down (London, British Museum, height 1.06 m), depicting the king as a high priest. It was installed in the temple, in a cult niche, and was an object of worship. Its composition is strictly frontal, the image of the king is idealized.
In the palace of Ashurnasirpal, very low, flat reliefs depicting battles and royal hunts have been preserved. They are rough, harsh in style and present a whole panorama of battle and hunting scenes. Despite the general anatomical correctness and detailed elaboration of the muscles of the legs and arms, the images of people and animals are stiff. The general scheme of reliefs by the time of Ashurnasirpal II was already completely established.
The paintings that decorated some rooms of the palace of Sargon II depicted processions in which the king appeared accompanied by his entourage and soldiers.
In the palace of King Sennacherib (705-681 BC), son of Sargon II, in Til-Barsib, a city located on one of the main roads connecting Assyria with Syria, there were also paintings on the walls depicting the king and his deeds ( fragments in Paris, in the Louvre and in the Aleppo Museum). Stylistically, these paintings are heterogeneous and cover the period from the second half of the 9th century BC. e. until the middle of the 7th century BC. e. They are made using white lime plaster, which is applied in a thin layer to the adobe wall over a layer of clay mixed with chopped straw. In some places you can even trace the artists’ work technique and the successive stages of this work. First, the contours of the images were applied with black paint, and then paints were applied: red-brown, ultramarine-blue, black and white, less often pink and blue. The coloring is conditional, flat, without shadows.
Palace of Ashurbanipal
The last period of flowering of Assyrian art came during the reign of Ashurbanipal, in the second half of the 7th century BC. e. Excavations discovered the ruins of his palace in Nineveh (modern Kuyunjik), where, in addition to various works of fine art, clay tablets with wedge-shaped texts were found, which made up the famous library of Ashurbanipal, which made it possible to get acquainted with the high level of Assyrian culture.
The reliefs still glorify the king and depict military and hunting scenes. They are executed differently: some works were performed by first-class craftsmen, others by artisans. The reliefs were conventionally painted. However, unlike the works of previous times, they convey the movement of the figures with great skill. The reliefs show the sequential development of action.
Magnificent, world-famous examples of reliefs from the palace of Ashurbanipal are slabs with scenes of lion hunting in the royal menagerie. The bodies of the animals are very softly worked out. The figures of the wounded lion and lioness are interpreted realistically. These reliefs are full of intense dramatic content. Particularly expressive is the mortally wounded lioness making her last attempt to rise.
In the reliefs of this time, depicting palace and cult scenes, there is less liveliness, canonical convention dominates in them, and decorativeness and fine detailing increase more than in previous periods.
. Artistic and aesthetic features of the culture of the Ancient East.
The development of ancient Eastern art was inextricably linked with many aspects of the general cultural processes of the East. The artistic aspect of Eastern life has absorbed the features of the economic and political structure, religious and philosophical ideas, everyday traditions, legal and ethical norms.
The role of an artist in ancient society was great and honorable. Sometimes the artist was equated to the rank of priests. But his activities were not considered self-sufficient. The painter, sculptor, and writer were called upon to implement the highest social principles through their creativity and to refuse any form of artistic experimentation that went beyond the prescribed tasks. This is due to the deep traditionalism of ancient Eastern cultures. Many ideas of the peoples of the East about the most important aspects of existence were formed very early and persisted for not only centuries, but millennia. Therefore, art, as an integral part of the cultural system, had to strictly follow both general cultural and artistic traditions.
The principles of symbolic construction of a work underlie Chinese painting and poetry, which recreate miniature models of the world in figurative form. The main theme of Eastern art is the theme of change, eternal movement (change of seasons, ambiguity of mental state, changeability of mood, alternation of birth and death, etc.) reveals the illusory, fragility of the world. Therefore, there is a double plan here that requires a multi-valued assessment.
In the artistic system of the Hindu-Buddhist East, preference is given to hidden beauty, not fully revealed to the eye, such beauty that requires leisurely contemplation, detachment from vanity, loneliness and peace. The emphasis is not on what is manifest, but on what is not, what is at rest, creating a situation of replacing a concrete and unambiguously perceived image with a symbolic one.
Each element of ancient Chinese painting is symbolic (pine is a symbol of longevity, bamboo is a symbol of perseverance, courage, the stork is a symbol of loneliness and holiness). The perception of such a work requires a special ability to detect contexts and combine symbolic images into a single aesthetic picture.
The most important symbol of the entire ancient Eastern artistic culture is the Sun. It is most often represented in a male form as the natural son and heir of the heavenly god. The sun inherits the most important quality of this deity - the ability to see everything and know everything. IN
The sun in Eastern cultures has usually been the most important sign of beauty. But “beautiful” was associated not only with radiance, brilliance and gold; it evoked not only a feeling of delight, but also awe, horror, and admiration, since the sun also symbolized the dark side of life. These two semantic shades of sparkling (brilliant light and terrible shine) are constantly present in the description of the Sun, separately or together.
Using the example of the symbolic nature of the Sun, it is clear that the semantics of this image organically combined elements of various cultural forms (philosophical, moral and ethical, religious, artistic, etc.). It was in the East that the solar (light) religion originated. And it is the solar deity in the process of development of civilizations that becomes the supreme state deity. The art of the East, operating with such polysemantic images and symbols, did not strive to clearly distinguish the artistic sphere from the general sociocultural context.
The aesthetic itself in the culture of the Ancient East often intersected with meanings of a different plane. In particular, the Egyptians considered the most important quality of wisdom to be the ability to record thoughts in writing - in hieroglyphs and drawings. Egyptian writing is combined, where each word was depicted with alphabetical, syllabic and picture-shaped signs. The art of painters was practically not separated from the art of scribes, that is, sages and literati. In Egypt, China, and other eastern cultures, the painter often framed his work with hieroglyphs, completing a single aesthetic whole. This connection was not accidental. Among the Egyptians, wisdom was closely associated with the ability to record it - writing and visual arts. This is not surprising. After all, ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs originated from drawings, and pictographic elements (pictography - picture writing) remained forever in their texts. The ancient Egyptian perceived a pictorial image as a sign-image possessing life-giving power. To create a pictorial sign of an object meant to preserve and perpetuate the beginning of life. But the hieroglyphic inscription is also a sign that has a similar ability. Writing, like art, was part of religion in Ancient Egypt, the work of priests.
The hieroglyphs decorating ancient Chinese scrolls also bore the stamp of high sacred meaning. They were an excellent addition to the symbols of nature embodied in colors and an assistant in interpreting the philosophical essence of the work. This painting, born in the Tang and Song eras, represents a very specific type of art. It is devoid of decorative principles and cannot be perceived from the standpoint of admiration. Such works require careful observation and immersion in the essence of what is depicted. Chinese painting - a scroll, born from a scroll book - is painting for educated people.
In Chinese artistic culture, there is an organic connection between painting and literature. The picturesqueness of Chinese poetry and the poetry of painting are an indissoluble synthesis that grew on the basis of the doctrine of “Tao” formed in ancient times, supplemented by Buddhist elements. The Chinese scroll was an expensive art, created for the wealthy consumer, but also for the educated, able to appreciate the philosophical context of the work. Such painting finds its audience among scientists and poets, nobles and government officials who have received special education and passed a series of strict examinations. Learning was considered one of the most important virtues in Chinese society. The artistic culture of Ancient China had a pronounced elitist character. Elitism was also characteristic of other ancient cultures of the East.
With all the diversity, and often dissimilarity, of the cultures of the Ancient East, one can detect common elements in the system of functioning of art.
Ancient Eastern artistic culture retained the magical purpose that was so characteristic of primitive society. Just like their ancient ancestors, the peoples of the first eastern civilizations believed that certain actions performed on the image contributed to their implementation in relation to the original.
The magical role of art was determined by the idea of the inextricable unity of man and nature. Artistic culture became a way of realizing higher spiritual principles that were beyond human skills and abilities. The beauty embodied in a work of art is not the result of the artist’s spiritual and material efforts. She is the embodiment of the beauty of nature, existing independently of the efforts of a creative person. She is neutral to any manifestation of “individuality.” The beauty of nature can be revealed to a master, a creator under certain conditions, in particular, at the moment of contemplation, the technology of which a person can comprehend with the help of religion and philosophy.
All the early cultures of the eastern region were anonymous. The artist did not seek to express the subjective author's position in the object of art. There was no personal element. Social, collective - received high sacred significance. The artist’s duty was to realize universal meanings.
Later, art will be perceived as a universal mechanism for instilling integrity in citizens. Thus, Confucius considered songs, rituals and music to be the basis of education. “Education begins with songs: it is established with ritual and ends with music.”
The artistic culture of the Ancient East embodies a high synthetic whole. This is no longer primitive syncretism, in which there are only embryonic elements of future types of arts, genres, artistic forms, along with elements of religion, politics, morality, etc. But art is still biased by religious, philosophical, moral and ethical systems, and other social structures.
The lack of a complete aesthetic system proper did not mean that the ancients did not understand the specific tasks of art. Even the Sumerians believed that artistic culture could give a person the pleasure of familiarizing himself with the highest spiritual values that are beyond biological nature. The only question is a shift in emphasis.
Architecture of the Ancient East What does the history of religions teach us?
FORMATION OF STATES IN THE SOUTH MEVORICHE. AKKADA AND SUMMER The southern Mesopotamia was formerly called Sennar; the Sumerians lived in its coastal part, some tribes of which penetrated into the northern part and founded the city and kingdom of Mari on the Euphrates. Later, a nomadic pastoral tribe from Arabia came to the north of Sennar and founded the city of Akkad. These tribes brought with them a culture of life different from the Sumerian one. In terms of physical type, the Sumerians differed sharply from the Akkadians. Sumerians are chubby people with slanted eyes, their heads and faces are always shaved. In contrast, the Akkadians are tall, bearded people with long, narrow faces and aquiline noses. This is how two social systems were formed, which later became Summero - the Akkadian kingdom. Ancient East SCHUMER The Sumerian settlers lived in a tribal system. The basis of agriculture was irrigation canals, ponds, reservoirs, and each clan community provided itself with water supplies. However, it was difficult to determine exactly the required amount of water for irrigation: excess or deficiency was equally bad; the most reasonable thing in these conditions was to direct irrigation from one place. And not to trust it to each community, to dig through canals as they please, temples become such a center of agricultural management. Gradually, temples began to control the life of neighboring cities and villages. Collect taxes and distribute provisions in difficult times. Historians called this management of the temple community. Usually the city arose around a temple dedicated to the local god. And as mentioned earlier, the city was ruled by the priests of the temple. The most famous cities of Summer were: UR, URUK, NIPPUR, KSHY, LAGASH and UMMA. At that time, Summer was not a single state, but represented areas separated from each other by the Euphrates and swamps, which made the cities of Summer unprotected from attacks by warlike neighbors. The center of each region was the strongest and richest city. To protect themselves from the attacks of ill-wishers - neighbors, a city militia was recruited, and the “lugal” led the wars. Gradually, through deception or military action, power in the Sumerian cities passed to military leaders. Using the wealth of the city's temples, the Lugali waged wars with neighboring cities, destroyed dams, killed thousands of people, and shortly before 2300 BC. e. The unrest in Sumerian cities became destructive. But seven centuries of Sumerian history left a rich culture that became a model for the entire territory of Mesopotamia. The Sumerians learned to build houses from clay bricks and cover the roofs of houses with reeds. To catch fish, they used small round boats made of reeds, which were coated with resin on the outside. It was the abundance of clay from which they built houses, sculpted toys and utensils, that suggested the idea of writing on clay tablets. It was difficult to write on viscous clay, and the characters turned out in the form of triangles of different sizes. Later such writing would be called cuneiform. The oldest records were found in temples, church ministers wrote down on them: how much grain and meat was produced and how much was given to workers for food, how much remained at the disposal of the temple. The Sumerians before the Greeks were the best mathematicians and astronomers of antiquity. The Sumerian pyramids were built before the Egyptian temples and have survived to this day. The Sumerian idea of the gods, the beginning of the world, and human destiny was reflected in many religions. Sumerian traditions were adopted by the ancient Jews, and they were later recorded in the Bible. The knowledge accumulated by the ancestors was passed on to young men in numerous temple schools, where they taught wisdom, observing the starry sky, mathematics, and construction. These people were creators and could not fight, so the Summers never managed to create a unified state. Sargon did it, he was an Akkadian. The Akkadians are also tribes from Mesopotamia, on the northern side, they maintained close relations with the Sumerians, caravan routes passed through the lands of Akkadia. Taking advantage of the strife between the Lugals, Sargon strengthened himself in the north of Summer, created a strong army, armed it with long-range bows and captured the south of the country. He did not accept any title from the Sumerians or his country. And he began to call himself the king of Sumer-Akkad. A new capital, Akkad, was built. Sargon established control over all temple households, and in return gave rich gifts to the temples. A powerful Sumerian-Akkadian kingdom arose, which lasted 100 years. After the formation of the kingdom, the Sumerians gradually began to mix with the Akkadians and other steppe peoples. At the same time, Sumerian culture spread widely in Mesopotamia and outlived its people for many centuries. KINGDOM OF AKKAD From the middle of the third millennium there was a steady increase in the productive forces of Shinar. This was especially clearly visible in its northern part, where soil conditions were more favorable for agricultural crops and where gardening began to develop alongside field farming. Date palm gardens appeared, which have not only food value, but also industrial value. Date pits burned slowly and produced a lot of heat; they were used in forges instead of coal, and the wood was used for carpentry. So, in the north of Shinar, agriculture became the main occupation; in the south, with its huge pastures in the wetlands, cattle breeding remained the main occupation. In this regard, internal trade began to develop; it was conducted by temples through their sales agents. In the north at this time the Semitic rulers of Akkad strengthened. The city of Akkad was located between the Euphrates and the Tigris in the place where the rivers converge closest to each other. Between the Tigris and Euphrates, in the area of Akkad, there ran a caravan road, connecting in the west with caravan routes to Arabia, and in the east with caravan routes to the mountainous region of Zagros. The central position of Akkad provided great benefits to the ruler of Akkad, who took possession of the regions of Opis and Sippar. The kingdom of Akkad, after its formation by Sargon in 2369, lasted about 180 years. One of the main conditions for the unification of Shinar into one state was the economic situation, which led to the division of production in the north and south and necessitated the establishment of permanent economic connections and exchange between Sumer and Akkad. The Sumerian-Akkadian kingdom collapsed under the onslaught of the Kitian nomads. The new dynasty that united Summer and Akkadia came from the city of Ur. Its rulers recreated the kingdom of Sargon and continued his policies. They took control of the temple farms, established supreme ownership over all the fields of Mesopotamia, but the kings of Ur brought state centralization to its extreme limits and half the country's population turned into slaves. The rulers of Ur often got involved in long wars, leaving their kingdom unprotected and in 2000 BC. e. The Summerian-Akkadian kingdom disappeared from the political map of Mesopotamia, destroyed and plundered by Amorite nomadic tribes.
Features of primitive art
Monuments of ancient art show us what people's attention was focused on during that period. Paintings and engravings on rocks, sculptures made of stone, clay, wood, and drawings on vessels are devoted exclusively to scenes of hunting game animals.
The main object of creativity of the Paleolithic, Mesolithic and Neolithic times were animals. Both cave paintings and figurines help us capture the most essential in primitive thinking. The spiritual powers of the hunter are aimed at comprehending the laws of nature. The very life of primitive man depends on this. The hunter studied the habits of a wild animal to the smallest detail, which is why the Stone Age artist was able to show them so convincingly. Man himself did not receive as much attention as the outside world, which is why there are so few images of people in cave paintings and Paleolithic sculptures are so close in the full sense of the word.
The main artistic feature of primitive art was the symbolic form, the conventional nature of the image. The symbols are both realistic images and conventional ones. Often works of primitive art represent entire systems of symbols that are complex in their structure, carrying a great aesthetic load, with the help of which a wide variety of concepts or human feelings are conveyed.
Images of the Upper Paleolithic can be divided into the following types:
I. Painting (“monumental”, that which decorates the walls and vaults of caves and “fragmentary” - painted on individual stones);
II. Primitive reliefs;
III. Sculpture (stone and bone carving);
IV. Engraving on stone and bone.
Painting. Primitive painting can be roughly divided into three large periods: Aurignacian (30 thousand years BC); Solutrean, beginning of the Magdalenian period (18 thousand years); Magdalenian period (XII millennium).
The earliest painting experiments known to us are “negative” handprints (i.e., tracing with an outline), then the hand is smeared with paint. It turns out that in the history of painting the silhouette was primary.
Examples of the first works of primitive art are schematic outline drawings of animal heads on limestone slabs found in the caves of La Ferrassie (France). These ancient images are extremely primitive and conventional. But in them, without a doubt, one can see the beginnings of those ideas in the minds of primitive people that were associated with hunting and hunting magic.
The hunter's eye detects images of familiar animals in the outlines of stones. He recognizes their silhouettes and outlines them with paint or a chisel. It is no coincidence that primitive painting develops in parallel with petroglyphs (images carved, embossed or scratched on stone) - recognizing the signs hidden on the surface of the stone - ideograms, the primitive artist helps them free themselves from inert matter and transfers them into three-dimensional space. The contour line framing the petroglyph gradually deepens, and the colorful line becomes more saturated in color and occupies a larger area. The surface of the stone inside the outline is filled with black or red paints. Using a second color in painting helps make the drawing more voluminous. Animals in cave painting are usually depicted in profile, and hooves and horns are depicted from the front or three-quarters. Towards the end of the first period, images appear that combine two different techniques - painting and petroglyphs.
Speaking about the perception of primitive painting in our time, it should be noted that each individual image was viewed in isolation from the neighboring one, because constant twilight reigned in the caves. Nothing has such a destructive effect on the true values of primitive art as the brilliance of electric light in this kingdom of eternal night. Trembling fires or small stone lamps filled with animal fat, examples of which have been discovered, allow only a fragmentary view of the colors and lines of the depicted objects. In such a soft, unstable light, the latter seem to acquire magical mobility. In strong lighting, captured lines and even painted surfaces lose their brightness and sometimes disappear altogether. Only in the first case can the fine veins of the patterns be seen without being suppressed by the rough surface of the stone. Primitive man did not associate caves with architecture.
For a long time, primitive painting was not known. In 1871, the Spanish archaeologist Marcelino de Savtuola first discovered images of bison on the walls and vaults of the Altamira Cave. His colleagues thought that the painting was created by Savtuola himself - the subject of universal ridicule, and not so long ago. Altamira became the first of many dozens of similar caves found later in France and Spain: La Mute, La Madeleine, Cambarrel, Font de Gaume Trois Freres with the famous image of a sorcerer in a mask and deer antlers, etc. The main monuments of primitive painting of the Paleolithic era are concentrated on south of France and Spain.
If we talk about our country, the famous Kapova Cave in the Southern Urals was discovered here in 1959. At great depths, seven mammoths, horses, rhinoceroses and anthropomorphic figures are written in red paint. This is the only place located outside the Franco-Cantabrian zone.
Rock art, including cave paintings of the Paleolithic era, flourished in the Solutrean and Magdalenian times. The bulk of the subjects of rock art were images of animals, usually made in life-size with primitive single contours: mammoth, rhinoceros, wild horse, deer, fallow deer, bull, bison, bison, elk. Most of the drawings from this time, found by archaeologists, were scratched with a chisel on the surface of the rock. Some of them, such as the images of animals in the Altamira Cave, discovered by Marcelino de Sautuola in 1879, and in the Lascaux Cave, were covered with paint. The artists used not only black paint (probably replaced by charcoal), but also yellow and red, which were obtained by grinding ocher and other minerals into powder. The powder was then mixed with water or fat. He used animal fat, blood, and honey as a binder. The paint was applied to the walls using a stick or brush made from animal fur. Perhaps this method was also used: the artist blew powder onto a damp wall using an improvised tube - a hollow bone, and the paint, as it hardened, retained its color for many millennia.
Paleolithic drawings also preserved traces of the beginnings of writing in the form of pictography. Geometric figures (sticks, triangles, trapezoids), indicating the direction of the path, the number of killed animals or the layout of the area, served as a kind of informational addition to the image. The primitive artist learned to generalize, abstract, acquired the skills of rational distribution of drawing elements on a plane, and experimented with color and volume. Evidence of the development of abstract thinking was the departure from the principle of naturalism, schematism and a decrease in the size of images during the Neolithic period. The main purpose of the drawings stemmed from the practical needs of people and was of a magical nature. The painting was supposed to attract game animals to the territory of the tribe or promote their reproduction, bring good luck in hunting, etc.
At the end of the Solutrean - beginning of the Magdalenian period, cave painting became more detailed and detailed, primitive masters began to pay more attention to details: they depicted wool with oblique parallel strokes, learned to use additional colors (various shades of yellow and red paint) to paint spots on the skins of bulls, horses and bison. The contour line also changed: it became brighter and darker, marking the light and shadow parts of the figure, folds of skin and thick hair (for example, the manes of horses, the massive scruff of bison), thus conveying volume. In some cases, ancient artists emphasized contours or the most expressive details with a carved line.
In the XII millennium BC. cave art reached its peak. The painting of that time conveyed volume, perspective, color and proportions of figures, and movement. At the same time, numerous ensembles of primitive painting were created: huge pictorial “canvases”, expressive cave frescoes and multi-figure compositions of a hunting and everyday nature (hunting and military scenes, dances and religious ceremonies), covering the vaults of deep caves, the continuation of monumental paintings in Lascaux, Freres, Montespan and many others.
One of the most interesting finds is the Lascaux Cave, discovered in 1940 and called the “prehistoric Sistine Chapel.” Currently, it has become a real museum representing the art of the Paleolithic era. Scientists have determined that the most ancient exhibits of the Lascaux cave were created in the 18th millennium BC. This unique museum opens with the Great Hall, or the Hall of the Bulls. A visitor who finds himself in this room sees a wall to his left with images of animals: a huge bull, a cow and a calf, a horse, a bear, and deer. The vaults at the end of the hall are covered with paintings representing bison, rams and horses. Between and above the figures of animals, ancient artists placed squares drawn in different colors, forming rectangles, wavy lines and images resembling plants.
The horse figures painted in golden ocher, outlined in black, are striking with their expressiveness and lively dynamics. With great accuracy, the primitive artist conveys the proportions of animals, and his ability to create volume and perspective is admired. The images of steppe horses and a cow preparing to jump over an obstacle invisible to the viewer are realistically and convincingly executed. Undoubtedly, the ancient painter had keen powers of observation and an excellent memory, because he did not depict his models from life. It is impossible to call this art realism in the full sense of the word, although in these monuments there are elements of typification and generalization, the search for expressive features characteristic of the animal depicted is clearly noticeable.
In the next room, on one of the walls, the viewer sees images of eight heads of rams. Four of them are written in red paint, four in black. On the opposite wall the artist placed five deer heads. On the right side of the hall there is a narrow corridor, the arch of which is covered with picturesque images and petroglyphs (drawings carved on stone) - small figures of animals, blocked by a huge silhouette of a cow. Horses and bison are also drawn here, the images of which are crossed by lines of arrows and spears.
In the last room of the Lascaux cave, an entire scene was painted in black paint, the meaning of which many scientists have tried to unravel. In the center of the picture is the figure of a falling man with a bird's head. To his right stands a wounded bison with its entrails spilling out and a spear running across the top of its body. Next to the man lies a spear thrower, decorated with the figure of a bird. On the left, the artist painted a rhinoceros, which, when running away, leaves behind clear dots-traces. Probably, the ancient master depicted a tragedy that happened to one of his fellow tribesmen: a man saw a bison mortally wounded by a rhinoceros and approached him. But the dying bison suddenly rushed at the hunter and knocked him down. The surprising thing about this image is that among all the drawings of the Magdalenian period found by archaeologists, it is the only one with a composition that combines animal and human figures. Therefore, researchers argued for a long time about its dating, attributing this monument of ancient art to a later time. But the execution technique and style indicate that the scene depicted by the artist still belongs to one of the early stages of the Magdalenian period.
The drawings of the Magdalenian period delight the viewer with the skill of their execution and their authenticity. Ancient artists very realistically convey the habits of animals and their manner of behavior. The bends of the body, the position of the legs and the turn of the head accurately show whether the animal is in motion or frozen, ready to hide at the slightest danger. The images found allowed scientists to determine what animals lived in those distant times. Thanks to the drawings discovered in the Chauvet Grotto, an astonishing discovery was made: animals that now live in hot African countries (lions, rhinoceroses) and inhabitants of the northern countries (reindeer) once existed in one place, on the territory of modern France. It is also surprising that in these polychrome (multi-color) paintings, the artists’ desire to convey perspective is noticeable: by changing the strength of tones, volumes are formed, thanks to which, as well as the ability to maintain proportions, a great resemblance to the objects of the image is achieved. The reliability of the drawings allowed the researchers to determine, for example, that in the Ekain cave the primitive painter painted a brown bear, and in the Chauvet grotto - a cave bear.
A careful study of the Lascaux paintings revealed one of the features of the work of the ancient masters: the drawing on the walls of the cave was sometimes layered on the previous one. Artists often depicted entire herds of animals; they are especially common in bone engravings. In such images, the figures in the foreground are depicted in detail, while the rest are depicted schematically.
In the picturesque ensemble of another cave - Altamira - numerous life-size figures of bison are presented on the ceiling. In addition to them, there are also horses and wild boars. The earliest images are represented by single-color outline drawings. The painting of the “Big Plafond”, just like in Lascaux, does not have composition in the modern sense of the word, since its main quality is lacking - orderliness.
Images of people or fantastic creatures possessing both human and animal characteristics are less common. For example, in the Chauvet Grotto, on the ledge of one of the walls, the figure of a half-man, half-bison is clearly visible. In most paintings, images of animals predominate; it was at this time that animal painting was born. Paleolithic painting reached its peak in the 12th millennium BC. e. It is from this time that the animalistic paintings of the caves of Rufignac, Nio, Montespan, Trois Freres, Font de Gaume, La Madeleine, Lascaux, Combarelles, Marsoula, etc. date back. Most of the drawings show the remarkable skill of ancient artists in conveying volume, perspective, proportions, as well as the ability to capture animal movement.
At the same time, with rare exceptions, pictorial monuments are chaotic heaps of drawings; only a few paintings have a composition combining two or three figures (a scene from Lascaux, as well as an image of a deer, a cow and a sorcerer - a man with a bull's head - from caves of Trois Freres). Artists often painted pairs of animals of the opposite sex (bulls, horses, deer, bison), which is most likely associated with magical rituals.
At the end of the Paleolithic, the technical skill of primitive painters improved, and drawing became free and dynamic. At the same time, the three-dimensionality gradually disappears, and the image takes on a flat and schematic appearance (for example, artists depict a hand in the form of a rake with five teeth on the fingers).
Primitive reliefs. When creating “high” reliefs (high relief), primitive man often used natural projections on the walls of caves, as, for example, in the “Bison” relief from the Spanish Castillo Cave. On the left wall of the Lascaux cave, an unusually expressive horse's head (Madeleine period) is scratched using the technique of in-depth relief, and in the Levanzo cave there is an image of a bison, currently partially hidden under stalagmite deposits. Later, the scratched relief technique would be developed in Ancient Egypt. Reliefs are not only painted on the walls of caves, they can also decorate human tools. One of these items is a spear thrower with a figurine of a bird (Madeleine, Museum of Saint-Germain, France). Along with zoomorphic reliefs, images of people are also recognizable. Presumably female and male images (bas-reliefs) from Lossel are in the Bordeaux Museum.
Creating a relief is a more labor-intensive task than painting, and besides, this hard physical work is carried out on an uneven surface. According to legend, the first picturesque images arose from the outline of a silhouette. Perhaps this also applies to the terrain. By penetrating the stone, the primitive master for the first time attempts to create the illusion of not only two-dimensional (painting), but also three-dimensional space of the wall, pushing its natural boundaries. Who are these animals and people on the reliefs - real creatures snatched from life or gods and patron totems of a given tribe? Most likely, the reliefs had their original, natural color, since, as evidenced by surviving paintings, the colors were quite durable and could not disappear without a trace on these products.
Sculpture (stone and bone carving). Plastic art is widely represented by sculptural images of animals (or their heads), and female figurines. The earliest primitive sculpture is the so-called. “Paleolithic Venus” from Willendorf (about 30 thousand years BC). It is difficult to judge to what extent this first sculpture is connected with reality. It’s hard to believe that this creature with a huge, hypertrophied lower part and sagging breasts from constant feeding was the standard of beauty for the people of that time. Perhaps there is some exaggeration of volume here, conveying the idea of motherhood, fertility, femininity. The face on this small figurine is not shown: it is covered with a cap of curly hair. Most of the "Venuses" of that time can be called faceless. Primitive sculptors were not interested in facial features; their task was not to reproduce a specific nature, but to create a certain generalized image of a woman-mother, a symbol of fertility and the keeper of the hearth. Male images in the Paleolithic era are very rare. At the same time, generalized expressive images of animals appear (figurines made of stone, bone and clay; engraved figures or heads on bone, stone, antler), recreating the characteristic features of a mammoth, elephant, horse, deer, etc.
The closer to the end of the Upper Paleolithic, the more the “Venuses” began to correspond to normal human proportions, such as the “Venus of Savignana” from Italy. Speaking in modern art historical language, the “Venus” from Willendorf gave rise to a number of imitations in different regions of Eurasia. The isolation of small groups of people from each other was so great that talking about influences, styles and schools is simply pointless. However, many similar “Venus” can be named: from Dolni Vestonice, Malta, Gagarino, Avdeevo.
The different climate gave rise to the “northern” edition of the typology of Willendorf Venuses - “Venus” from Kostenki. Her main feature is that she is dressed in a "fashionable" and practical fur jumpsuit.
The materials from which primitive sculpture was created were different. This is clay and ash mixed with burnt bones and fat. The first clay products were found at the largest site of Paleolithic hunters in Dolni Vestonice (Czechoslovakia). Small sculptures made from a clay mixture are the oldest examples of ceramics.
In addition to clay, easy-to-process steatite, calcite, and, finally, mammoth bone were also used. It is from this that one of the earliest female (or male) heads from Brassempouy (Aurignacian period, France, Saint-Germain Museum) is created. It is assumed that this head with a decorative stylized hairstyle is a fragment of the now lost ancient Venus. The head mentioned is also devoid of facial features. The heroes of primitive art have not yet acquired faces, possessing a certain degree of convention, and at the same time they are naturalistic reproductions of female figures and heads. From this moment on, humanity begins to navigate three-dimensional space, and masterpieces of round sculpture are created.
Engraving on stone and bone. The art of bone carving is a favorite pastime of the peoples of the modern North to this day. It also originated then, in the Paleolithic era. A famous image on a bone plate dating back to the Madeleine era was the so-called “Deer Crossing the River” (France, Saint-Germain Museum). The frieze-like composition represents the ongoing event in a “cross-section”: the view of the deer is shown “from the side”, as if the master himself had climbed into the river and was swimming at some distance from these animals; together with them a school of fish is shown, and the images of these fish can be called “X-ray”, since their skeleton is clearly visible. The heads of the fish touch the bodies of the deer, their rhythmic alternation allows us to perceive this composition as an ornament, the first ornament where the real world appears before us clearly and visibly. It is still devoid of the decorative stylization of subsequent times. The primitive artist here does not show any inclination towards abstract generalization of the material.
The Paleolithic is the oldest and longest period in history. For the study of the art of the primitive system, the Late Paleolithic is most important, since it was during this period that the clan organization finally took shape and art appeared in its original form. The Late Paleolithic is the time of the birth of primary religious beliefs: magic, totemism and animism, which are inextricably linked with art and are expressed both in sculpture and in the visual arts of the primitive system. Some scientists consider the version that it was the emerging religious beliefs that gave impetus to the development of art and its further improvement.
Having mastered the skills of creating primitive tools in previous periods, Late Paleolithic man gradually improved them; he had already learned certain crafts, the ability to build primitive dwellings, tanning animal skins, and a clan organization began to take shape. It should be noted that back in the Middle Paleolithic era, man began to create the first objects associated with spiritual needs. This is evidenced by finds in the La Ferasi cave in France - small stone slabs with colorful spots applied to them or hollowed out depressions located in a strict order.
At the beginning of the Late Paleolithic, a round sculpture of small sizes (from 5 to 10 cm) appeared, created from soft rocks of stone, horn, bone, clay, that is, those materials that can be processed. Conventionally, reliefs carved on cave walls can be classified as Late Paleolithic sculpture. The subjects all refer to images of animals that humans hunted. Apparently, they had magical significance and served as an element of magical rituals in the Late Paleolithic. Small plastics are especially common in Eastern Europe and Siberia.
Separately, we can consider as an example of plastic art - figurines of women created according to the same principle. The limbs of such figures are barely outlined, facial features are absent, but at the same time the signs of a woman-mother are exaggeratedly emphasized. This is most likely connected with the image of the ancestor and the beginnings of the cult of fertility. Similar figurines are often found in the Late Paleolithic. The most famous of them is the Venus of Willendorf. Facial features are simply not important to the artist. If necessary, Paleolithic masters were quite good and expressive in conveying the appearance of a person. This is clearly visible in the head from Brassempouille. And in the image of the head from Dolni Vestonitsa, this is not a generalized face, but a specific appearance of a person, a young girl, with individuality and emotional coloring.
Concluding the review of Paleolithic sculpture, we can say that its main feature is the ability to choose the main thing, highlight the main feature of what is depicted, the gradual complication of forms, the use of simplified, but very expressive techniques in practice. Primitive man can already create the form he needs, give it expressiveness, and senses the specific expressive capabilities of the material.
Art arose in the Paleolithic. In the Upper Paleolithic, it is represented by cave painting, anthropomorphic sculpture of small forms made of bone and stone, engraving on bone, stone tiles, and plates of mammoth tusks.
The appearance of art in the Paleolithic is an important fact in the history of mankind, associated with the physiological characteristics of the Upper Paleolithic man - the development of his brain, primarily the centers of speech and associative thinking. In this regard, it is worth mentioning some modern misconceptions. When "scientific" elephants, monkeys, birds and other animals leave color spots, this is declared as the ability of animals to create works of art. However, no animal can create works of art as a result of creativity. At best, the animal can draw a likeness of what is shown to it, using the drawing materials provided to it.
The first works of primitive art - engravings on bones - were found in the 30s. XIX century But then no one paid attention to them. A revolution in views on primitive art was made by the discovery of Paleolithic cave painting. In 1879, the Spanish archaeologist M. de Sautuola discovered bison and horses painted in brick-red ocher on the vaults of the Spanish Altamira cave - the first open monument of polychrome Paleolithic painting. The discovery of Sautuola seems epoch-making in its significance, but, nevertheless, it was met with misunderstanding. The whole point is that science was then dominated by views on ancient man as a wild and backward creature. Only 20 years later, when similar drawings were discovered in caves in France, it became clear that these were works of art from the Old Stone Age.
Currently, more than 40 caves with remains of Paleolithic painting are known. The most famous and well-studied of them are the European Rafignac, Lascaux, Nio, Cambarel, Lorte, Font de Gaume and others, discovered in 1959 in Bashkiria on the banks of the river. Belaya, images were discovered in the Kapova Cave. Its vaults are covered with images of mammoths, rhinoceroses, and horses. All drawings are made in red ocher on the brown-gray surface of the walls. 20 years later, Paleolithic images were also discovered in the depths of the Ignatievskaya Cave in the Urals.
Paleolithic art is distinguished by amazing accuracy in conveying the most essential features of humans and animals; it is characterized by simplicity of forms. The earliest images are contour and monochromatic; later ones, as a rule, are multi-colored, conveying volume and shape. But this was not the only thing that demonstrated the skill of ancient artists. It was also reflected in the ability to convey the dynamics and characteristics of animals. Horses, bulls, and deer are often shown running. Paleolithic animal art reached a high level. The beginnings of narrative paintings are found in Paleolithic art. Such are, for example, group images of animals in Altamira, galloping horses in Lascaux, and deer crossing the river in the Lorte grotto.
Rice. 14.
1 - the oldest Paleolithic calendar on a plate made of mammoth tusk (Malta site, Siberia); 2 - image of a bison from the Altamira cave (Spain)
The subjects of primitive art show what thoughts and feelings guided the people who created them. The semantic side of Paleolithic art and its role in the life of man of that period are significant. The traditional depiction of animals, and not all of them, but only those that had value as objects of hunting, is obviously associated with the emergence of the primitive cult of the beast and hunting magic. In Altamira, for example, female bison are depicted giving birth, and nearby there are rhythmically repeating signs of the lunar cycle, which is not accidental.
Rice. 15.
1 - lions from the Chavier cave (France) (according to D. Kiot); 2 - image of a mammoth from the Rofignac cave (France); 3 - fallow deer from Altamira cave (Spain)
Figurines depicting women are found in many Upper Paleolithic settlements in Eurasia. They are small, carved from bone and stone, their size does not exceed 5-12 cm (small plastic).
The European and Siberian groups of figures are known. European figures emphasize the signs of gender: drooping breasts, massive hips, bulging belly. Siberian figurines are more elongated, the hips and shoulders of the images are narrowed. Siberian figurines are depicted dressed in fur clothing. It is interesting that in all the sculptures the head is shown in a generalized way, in the form of a thickening; in most cases, the face is completely absent.
Figurines depicting women are most often found broken near or in special recesses. On this basis, the opinion arose that they served to perform ritual actions. It is also believed that individual figurines were symbols of real or mythical female ancestors or carry a generalized aesthetic ideal of the Paleolithic era, being at the same time a reflection of the cult of fertility, images of priestesses and images of ancestors. With all the diversity of opinions, the presence of figurines indicates the existence, to some degree or another, of a cult of a female deity. They contain both realistic and mythological ideas about a woman - mother, housewife, keeper of the hearth, ancestor, fertility deity or “mistress” of game animals.
Rice. 16.
In the Upper Paleolithic, engraving on bone and stone was widespread, subtly conveying images of people and wild animals. Graphic images are numerous and varied: from a vague jumble of lines to realistic images of people’s heads with certain portrait features and images of animals. Made by tracing, the images in their essence differed from traditional cave painting and canonical female figurines - graffiti was fully “folk art”, free from any canons, they painted whatever they wanted, and everyone who wanted.
Several types of engraved images on plates can be distinguished: portrait and everyday narrative sketches, semantic scenes and individual images, sign-calendar systems, in particular calendar entries of the lunisolar calendar on a pendant and plate, discovered in Malta. The Maltese plate is considered by some archaeologists as a counting calendar and astronomical table indicating the annual revolutions of the Sun, Moon and monthly phases of the Moon.
Rice. 17. Engraved images of people, animals and anthropomorphic creatures in the Upper Paleolithic art of Eurasia
Federal Agency for Culture and Cinematography of the Russian Federation
Branch of Moscow State University of Culture and Arts
Department of Social and Humanitarian Disciplines
Test
Course: “History of Fine Arts”
topic: Specific features of the art of primitive society
Completed:
2nd year student
group 802
Aleeva Yu. R.
Checked:
Rudneva Ya.B.
Naberezhnye Chelny, 2010
Introduction………………………………………………………………………………3
Paleolithic art………………………………………………………4
Mesolithic art………………………………………………………..9
Neolithic art………………………………………………………………………………10
Art of the Bronze Age……………………………………………………...15
Art at the beginning of the Iron Age……………………………………………………20
Conclusion………………………………………………………………………………24
References………………………………………………………...25
Introduction
Man's amazing ability to perceive and recreate images of the world around him has its roots going back thousands of years. Primitive art developed over a very long time, and in some parts of the world - in Australia and Oceania, several regions of Africa and America - it existed until the 20th century. under the code name “traditional art”.
The specificity of primitive art lies in its fusion with other forms of social consciousness. It reflects all spheres of society - economic, social and religious. Most often, ancient sculpture is found in special places of worship or in burials. This speaks of its inextricable connection with religious ideas and rituals. The consciousness of ancient people was a complex interweaving of realistic and illusory principles, and this syncretism of primitive thinking had a decisive impact on the nature of creative activity.
From its very inception, primitive visual arts developed in two directions. The first of these includes monumental forms(drawings in caves and on rocks, megaliths), the second is presented monuments of art of small forms: small sculpture, clay sculpture, artistic carving on stone, bone and wood.
Entire areas of ancient artistic creativity disappeared without a trace in the depths of millennia. Even wood is preserved only in special conditions - in the extremely wet soil of peat bogs, and materials such as birch bark, fur, fabrics are extremely short-lived and are extremely rare in archaeological excavations. Ethnographic observations indicate that they were widely used by primitive people to make objects of art. But those few monuments of primitive art that have come down to us are extremely diverse and expressive.
Paleolithic art
Paleolithic (Old Stone Age) is the earliest and longest period in human history. Moreover, art originated only in the late (Upper) Paleolithic, that is, about 40 thousand years BC, when, according to archaeologists, all types of fine art appeared.
At its core, Paleolithic art is naively realistic. He is characterized by a powerful spontaneous sense of life, masculinity and simplicity. At the same time, while showing vigilance in relation to individual objects, primitive man was not yet able to grasp the whole picture of the world, generalize and connect phenomena with each other and nature. He did not master the composition, did not give a detailed plot, did not feel the space.
Paleolithic monuments have been found in large numbers in Europe, South Asia and North Africa. An outstanding place in this series is occupied by paintings on the walls and ceilings of caves, in the depths of underground galleries and grottoes. Early drawings are primitive: contour images of animal heads on limestone slabs (caves of La Ferrassie, Pech-Merle in France); random interweaving of wavy lines pressed into damp clay with fingers - the so-called “pasta” or “meanders”; impressions of human hands outlined in paint - so-called “positive” or “negative” handprints.
Handprints of primitive man. 30-21st millennium BC e. Monumental images were applied with a flint chisel on stone or paint on a layer of raw clay on the walls of caves. Earth paints, yellow and brown ochre, red-yellow iron ore, black manganese, coal and white lime were used in painting.
Paleolithic art reached its peak in Magdalenian period(25-12 thousand BC). In rock paintings, the image of the beast takes on specific features; animals are depicted in motion. In painting, a transition is made from the simplest contour drawing, evenly filled with paint, to multi-color painting; by changing the strength of tones, three-dimensional forms are modeled. The most characteristic examples of the Magdalenian period are associated with cave paintings - single images almost life-size, but not connected by action into a single composition: Altamira (Spain), Lascaux, Nio (Nio), Font-de-Gaume (France), Kapova Cave (Russia) ) and etc.
At the end of the 19th century. cave painting was still unknown. In 1877, in Spain, in the province of Santander, archaeologist Marcelino de Savtuola discovered images on the walls and ceiling of the Altamira cave. The discovery was published, but the material turned out to be so unexpected and sensational that the archaeological community considered it a fake. Only in 1897, the French archaeologist Emile Rivière was able to prove the authenticity of the images he discovered on the walls of the La Moute cave (France). To date, as a result of targeted searches, about a hundred caves with images and other traces of primitive man’s presence in them have been found in France alone.
In September 1940, one of the most famous primitive caves, Lascaux (Lasko) in France, was discovered quite by accident. This cave, which modern researchers call the “prehistoric Sistine Chapel,” was discovered by four boys who, while playing, climbed into a hole that opened under the roots of a tree that had fallen after a storm.
"Scene with the wounded buffalo." Rock painting. Upper Paleolithic. Lascaux Cave. Dordogne department. France.
"Bulls". 15-11th millennium BC e. Painting of the Lascaux cave. France
Lascaux has now been turned into a first-class museum. Lascaux painting is one of the most perfect artistic works of the Paleolithic era. Its oldest images date back to approximately 18 thousand BC. The cave complex consists of several “halls”. The most perfect part in terms of the quality of painting and excellent preservation is considered to be the “Great Hall” or “Hall of the Bulls”.
The Shulgan-Tash cave, better known as Kapova, is located in the Southern Urals in the valley of the Belaya River in the territory of the reserve of the same name (Republic of Bashkortostan). Images of animals on the walls of the Kapova Cave were discovered in 1959. They were contour and silhouette drawings made with red ocher based on animal glue. Currently, speleologists have discovered 14 drawings of animals. Among them are mammoths, horses, rhinoceros and bison. Most of the images are concentrated in the “Hall of Drawings”, in addition, images were later found on the southern wall in the “Hall of Chaos”. In addition to the identified images of animals, geometric signs, anthropomorphic images and fuzzy outlines shaded with ocher are noted on the walls of the cave.
During the Upper Paleolithic era, carvings on stone, bone, wood, as well as round plastic art developed. The oldest figurines of animals - bears, lions, horses, mammoths, snakes, birds - are distinguished by accurate reproduction of the main volumes, texture of fur, etc. Perhaps these figurines were created as a container for souls, which is in good agreement with ethnographic data, and served as amulets-amulets that protected people from evil spirits.
The image of a woman - one of the main subjects in the art of the Late Paleolithic era - was brought to life by the specifics of primitive thinking, the need to reflect in a “tangible” concrete figurative form the ideas about the unity and kinship of primitive communities. At the same time, these images were also attributed with special magical powers, the ability to influence the successful outcome of the hunt. Figures of dressed and naked women of that period - “Paleolithic Venuses” - in terms of the perfection of their forms and thoroughness of processing, indicate a high level of development of bone-carving skills among Ice Age hunters. Made in the style of naive realism during the period of matriarchy, the figures convey with utmost expressiveness the main idea of this generalized image - a woman as a mother, ancestress, keeper of the home.
If Eastern Europe is characterized by images of plump women with exaggerated female forms, then female images of Siberia of the Upper Paleolithic do not have such exaggerated modeled forms. Carved from mammoth ivory, they represent two types of women: “thin” with a narrow and long torso and “massive” with a short torso and deliberately exaggerated hips.
"Woman with a Cup." Limestone relief (from Laussel, Hautes-Pyrenees, France). Upper Paleolithic. Museum of Fine Arts. Bordeaux.
T.n. Venus of Willendorf. Limestone (from Willendorf, Lower Austria). Upper Paleolithic. Natural History Museum. Vein.
Mesolithic art
In the Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age) and Neolithic (New Stone Age) eras, the development of the population of the south and north took different paths. This difference was especially pronounced in economic activities, which were most closely related to the specific natural conditions of each of the two zones. The law of uneven development of different regions came into force. And if in the southern regions during this period people began to lead a sedentary lifestyle - tribes of farmers and cattle breeders appeared, then in the north traditional forms of farming - hunting and gathering - continued to develop. With the retreat of glaciers in Europe, warming begins.
Profound changes in climatic conditions have led to significant changes in flora and fauna. Reindeer, which served as the main prey of Magdalenian hunters, is finally disappearing in Southern and Central Europe. The subject of hunting is elk, red deer, bison, wild boar, small animals, and waterfowl. Fisheries are developing intensively. The processing of stone tools is being improved, thanks to the invention of the boat, very vast spaces are beginning to be actively developed, and the appearance of the bow and arrow makes hunting more effective. The emergence of patriarchy complicates relationships between people.
The role of magic is increasing, the naive perception of nature disappears.
These changes were reflected in art, primarily in rock paintings. If Paleolithic cave painting consists of individual, unrelated figures, then Mesolithic rock painting is dominated by multi-figure compositions, vividly reproducing various episodes from the life of hunters. Colorful and engraved images of small size on the open rocks of Eastern Spain, the Caucasus, and Central Asia demonstrate a clearly expressed new approach to solving a plot scene, due to an appeal to the compositional principle of organizing visual material, on the basis of which an expressive and semantic whole is created, a narrative beginning is developed.
The central place, both in quantity and quality of images, belongs to scenes of hunting and battles. “Fighting Archers” is one of the most striking Mesolithic compositions (Eastern Spain). The content of the image is related to the person. The battle itself is reproduced using eight human figures. They are variants of a single motif: a person in rapid movement is depicted with somewhat zigzag dense lines, slightly widening in the upper part of the “linear” body, and a rounded spot on the head. The main pattern in the arrangement of the figures is their repeatability at a certain distance from each other.
Neolithic art
Significant changes in the life of primitive society made it possible to call this period of history the “Neolithic revolution.” The melting of glaciers, which left a mark in the memory of mankind in the form of the legend of the Great Flood, set in motion peoples who began to intensively populate new spaces. The most significant change was the transition to a productive economy, which involves a sedentary lifestyle with permanent settlements. Man learned to build new types of housing - on stilts, structures made of sun-dried bricks (raw bricks), and learned to defend his settlement. In the art of that time, images of people began to play an increasingly significant role, and the activities of the collective became the central theme of art.
The visual creativity of the Eurasian population in the Neolithic era is represented by two directions: monumental rock paintings
"Leopards". Rock relief
in Fezzan (Libya). Neolithic. Schematic images of human figures. Rock painting. Neolithic. Sierra Morena Mountains. Spain.
and monuments of art of small forms - wooden, stone and bone sculpture, clay sculpture and images on ceramics.
Bucket from the Gorbunovsky peat bog (Sverdlovsk region, RSFSR). Tree. Neolithic. Historical Museum. Moscow
Ax in the shape of a moose head. Polished stone. Neolithic. Historical Museum. Stockholm
Tools decorated with reliefs. Bone (from the Isturitz cave, Bas-Pyrenees department, France). Neolithic. Private collection. Paris.
Ceramic production is one of the most ancient on earth. The presence of easily accessible material – clay – led to the early and almost universal development of ceramic craft. Initially, back in the Paleolithic, the main type of ceramic products were thick-walled vessels with a porous shard and a round or conical bottom. They were sculpted by hand by building up individual strands of clay. Crushed shells and crushed granite were added to the clay so that it would not crack when fired over an open fire. Based on numerous fingerprints, it was established that the oldest ceramic vessels were made by women.
During the Neolithic era, humanity first learned to skillfully make pottery. The richness of forms (jugs, bowls, cups) and the ornamentation of Neolithic vessels allow us to consider them as artistically designed works of art. It is possible to trace the development of the ornament from the simplest patterns, extruded with a stamp and a point (the so-called pit-comb type), which covered the entire outer surface of the vessels in various combinations, to much more diverse and artistically expressive paintings, consisting of rhythmically alternating spirals, concentric circles, wavy lines , mesh and checkerboard patterns, etc. The patterns were often multi-colored. Combinations of red, white, black and other colors were used.
Neolithic craftsmen knew and appreciated clear rhythm, symmetry in the arrangement of patterns, proportionality of forms and strict ornamental composition. It is ceramics in its more or less mass production, due to its uniformity and slow evolution of decorative elements, that gives archaeologists reliable chronological guidelines and allows us to talk about a particular archaeological culture, most often of one region.
The earliest examples include ceramics from the settlements of Karadepe and Geoksyur in Central Asia. All the signs of the painting have a certain meaning associated with the emerging animistic (animate) perception of nature. In particular, the cross is one of the solar signs denoting the sun or moon.
Tripolye ceramics (Tripolye village, Ukraine) marks the next stage in the development of ceramics, dating back to the end of the 3rd millennium BC. Significant changes are taking place in the content of the paintings. Tripoli ceramics depict wavy, zigzag lines, a running spiral, rhombuses, crosses, as well as people, animals - in other words, many elements. Moreover, all abstract pictorial forms are full of semantic significance. A wavy line is a river, a running spiral is the continuous running of the sun, the movement of time, rhombuses are symbols of a female deity sending “heavenly moisture” to the earth, a cross is a solar disk, a zigzag line is a snake, the patroness of the house, a mediator between heaven and earth, a symbol of rain , “herringbone” is a plant or cereal ear.
Ceramic painting represented a unique narrative about the surrounding reality in all its versatility and diversity. The focus of human consciousness is no longer on a single phenomenon (beast), not a single action of people, a specific event in the life of human society (battle, hunting, dance, etc.), but the diversity of the surrounding world - a new, higher and more complex stage of development consciousness (including abstract thinking) of primitive man.
Separately, it is necessary to say about the development of ornament, which appears not only on clay vessels, but also on other household items. The simplest ornament appears as a trace of weaving coated with clay. Subsequently, geometric patterns (parallel stripes, double spirals, zigzags, concentric circles, etc.) and plant motifs with various semantic meanings appear.
In the ancient sculpture of Neolithic hunter-fishermen, two main themes were embodied: man and beast. The continuation of the traditions of Paleolithic art can be seen especially clearly in zoomorphic sculpture. It is characterized by a realistic interpretation of the image, careful modeling of the animal's face, and the stability of visual techniques when conveying individual details. The sculpture is dominated by images of individual animal heads, which is one of the features of primitive animal art. In the eyes of the ancient hunter, the head personified the very essence of the beast. The specificity of primitive thinking forced him to express this idea visually, and therefore the head was made disproportionately large, and its details were drawn out especially carefully. This pattern is also observed when depicting the full figure of an animal.
Anthropomorphic figurines were made from the same materials as everyday objects (wood, clay, bone, horn, stone). However, in certain historically established groups, a certain selectivity of material can be traced, which is probably due to ethnic tradition and the purpose of specific images. We can also talk about the predominance of one or another type of image in certain centers of ancient art. The discovery of figurines of foreign types in such a hearth indicates the existence of contacts between the populations of different areas. Anthropomorphic and zoomorphic figurines, conveying certain images of ancient mythology, were, undoubtedly, integral accessories of very specific religious rites. Anthropo-zoomorphic figurines, found in small quantities, symbolized the inextricable connection of man with the nature around him.
Anthropomorphic guise. Rock art. Neolithic. Sheremetyevo rocks. Khabarovsk region.
Another characteristic genre of fine art in the Neolithic era were petroglyphs - multi-figure plot compositions in which images of humans and animals predominate. Petroglyphs were common in Northwestern Europe, the Urals, Siberia, Transcaucasia, and Central Asia. They were knocked out on rocks or rocky river banks (“Boats, deer”, 2nd millennium BC, Karelia).
Bronze Age Art
Usually, two large periods are distinguished - the Chalcolithic (Copper-Stone Age) - the transition period from the Stone Age to the Metal Age and the Bronze Age (III - II millennium BC). Important milestones in human history are associated with the Bronze Age. First of all, this is the further spread of the productive economy - agriculture and cattle breeding and the development of a new material - metal, primarily copper and its alloys. At the beginning of the Metal Age, contacts between peoples living over vast territories expanded. This process was especially noticeable in the territory of steppe Eurasia, where a productive cattle-breeding economy has been developing since the paleometal era. This was largely due to new technical inventions, in particular, with the advent of the wheeled cart, and in the Late Bronze Age - with the use of horses for riding.
In the Bronze Age, with the introduction of new forms of economy and metal tools, a large social division of labor occurred, which created the conditions for regular exchange and increased property inequality. Craft is separated from agriculture, male labor is becoming increasingly important, which finally leads to the establishment of patriarchy, unquestioning submission to the elders in the clan community.
Since the end of the Neolithic, art has been enriched with more and more new subjects. The subject matter of images is expanding, new techniques for conveying images are emerging, the role of figurative symbolism is sharply increasing, and the tendency to depict fantastic characters is becoming more and more noticeable. On the other hand, there is a desire for stylization and simplification of the drawing. Images of animals appear less and less often. Geometric patterns are spreading everywhere, for which the main thing is the sign.
The art of the Bronze Age has a number of features. It is becoming more diverse and spreading geographically. Petroglyphs, images on stone steles and slabs, sculpture, small sculptures, ornaments, the use of artistic images in the design of tools and household items - all this is becoming a ubiquitous phenomenon. In the art of this time, for the first time, it is possible to trace vivid themes associated with the mythology of ancient peoples, in particular Indo-European ones. The images of ancient art become a kind of “visual language”, a sign system understandable to related groups of the population. This feature of ancient art continues to manifest itself especially clearly in the ornamentation of ceramics and other household items.
In the visual arts of the Bronze Age, two main directions can be distinguished: anthropomorphic and zoomorphic sculpture and household items - wooden, clay, stone, bone and bronze, as well as structures of megalithic architecture.
The ancient art of the European northwest is extremely characterized by a unique anthropomorphic clay sculpture. A special group in it consists of small human figures with a strongly curved body. Despite the plastic properties of clay, which allow for wide variations in shapes, these images are made in strictly regulated canons. The image itself is extremely generalized: the arms are missing, the legs are shown together. Details such as a massive protruding nose and a “visor” hanging over the face are emphasized.
Among the early monuments of primitive canonized art are anthropomorphic sculptures widespread in the southern regions of Europe and the Mediterranean, including the so-called “stone women” of the Northern Sea Coast - vertically standing, roughly hewn stone slabs with a more or less clearly marked head and arms folded on the chest . Among the additional elements (bow, mace, staff), the most canonical are the images of the belt and the human foot. The signs of gender are not always indicated on the steles, but some indirect evidence indicates that most of the anthropomorphic sculptures of the late Neolithic and Bronze Age correspond to their Russian nickname “stone woman”. In France, where such images are found not only on steles, but also in the form of reliefs carved on the walls of numerous caves, they are considered the personification of the Neolithic goddess - “the patroness of the dead.”
There are also images of people in wood (Eastern Trans-Urals). The variety of forms of anthropomorphic sculpture in the Early Bronze Age clearly shows that already at that time, as a result of the primitive collective’s awareness of the social essence of man, his image occupied one of the central places in the work of ancient masters.
Mastering the technique of bronze casting expanded the creative capabilities of ancient masters. Bronze items, tools, and weapons appeared. Often the handles of bronze daggers are topped with the heads of animals, in particular moose. Made in metal, they continue the traditions of ancient wood and horn carving.
The art of bronze casting was especially clearly manifested in the objects of the Galich treasure (mid-2nd millennium BC), found in the Kostroma region and now located in the State Historical Museum in Moscow. Particularly interesting is the bronze dagger, the handle of which is crowned with the head of a snake with an open mouth. In the slot of the handle there is an image of a crawling snake. Among the items in the treasure is a bronze face mask, repeating the basic facial features of anthropomorphic male idols. It is topped with two profile images of animals looking in opposite directions. A hollow figure of an animal with a long tail and a “beak-like” muzzle is also included in the treasure. In general, the bronze items of the Galich treasure probably represent attributes associated with the formation of shamanism.
The most important phenomenon that almost universally characterized the Bronze Age was megalithic architecture. Monuments of megalithic architecture were closely connected with religious and cult tasks and thus went beyond the scope of immediate utilitarianism. The relatively uniform nature of these ancient architectural structures, approximately the same time of their appearance in Europe, their huge number and unusually wide distribution indicate the existence of some homogeneous beliefs that existed among various peoples who erected these gigantic monuments everywhere from Ireland to Burma and Korea, from Scandinavia and Madagascar. There are about four thousand of them in France alone.
There are three types of megalithic structures:
· Menhirs– lonely cigar-shaped stone pillars up to 20 meters high – bear the features of both architecture and sculpture. Sometimes reliefs were carved on them, sometimes their shape resembled a human figure (conditionally, “stone women” can also be classified as menhirs). They were erected on a hill, and the force of impact on the viewer was achieved by the contrasting juxtaposition of the proudly rising vertical mass of a powerful monolith with the small wooden huts or dugouts surrounding it.
· The architectural principle is most strongly expressed in dolmens- most likely burial structures made of several vertically placed stones, covered with a wide horizontal stone slab. Dolmens are widespread in Western Europe, North Africa, Crimea and Kakaz.
· More complex buildings – cromlechs. The most grandiose of them was erected at Stonehenge (beginning of the 2nd millennium BC, England) from huge roughly hewn tetrahedral blocks of blue stone. In plan, it is a round platform with a diameter of 30 meters, closed by four rings of vertically placed stones, connected by beams lying on them, forming something like a giant round dance. The inner ring, in the center of which there is a stone slab - possibly an altar, is made up of small menhirs.
Archaeological excavations often uncover burials within, under, or near megalithic monuments. This leads archaeologists to interpret the monuments as places of special significance for the funeral rituals followed by the agricultural communities of the area.
In New Grange (Ireland) there is a huge 11-meter mound made of stones and peat. Through the base of the mound, a corridor stretches 24 meters deep, lined with massive stones below and above. It ends with three rooms, also lined with stone. On certain days, the rays of the rising sun penetrate the corridor and illuminate the central hall, located in the very depths.
In Carnac (Brittany, France), rows of vertical stones stretch across the plain for several kilometers. Today, of the ten thousand stones originally supplied, only three thousand remain. Although no burials have been found under the Karnak menhirs, there are many megalithic graves nearby.
The hypothesis of some unknown unified cultural tradition is also supported by the fact that not only the idea of such structures itself is becoming widespread, but also some symbols and decorative elements associated with them, including solar signs. The possibility of a connection between megalithic structures and the cult of the sun is also indicated by the fact that some of them (for example, Stonehenge) are oriented with their main axis to the point of sunrise on the day of the summer solstice.
Art at the beginning of the Iron Age
The widespread use of iron finally supplanted stone tools and gradually completely replaced bronze ones in the 1st millennium BC, which led to the further rapid development of human economic life.
The most famous works of art of that period are the bronze and iron objects discovered in the Scythian burial mounds.
The world first learned about the Scythians more than 2.5 thousand years ago from the Greeks, who then began to explore the Northern Black Sea region and here encountered warlike semi-nomadic tribes of skilled horsemen. Herodotus (5th century BC) dedicated an entire book to the Scythians in his “History,” who, it is believed, himself visited the Black Sea region and traveled through these places.
There are two understandings of the term “Scythians”: ethnographic and geographical. Actually, the Scythians lived in the Black Sea region, between the Danube and Don. Greek and Latin texts preserved several Scythian names and place names, from which it is clear that their language belonged to the Indo-Iranian group of the Indo-European language family. Of the modern languages, the Ossetian language is closest to Scythian. Judging by their appearance, as well as by numerous identifications of skulls from excavated burials, the Scythians were undoubtedly Caucasians. Therefore, Blok’s “slanting and greedy eyes” are the fantasy of the great poet. Conventionally, such Scythian tribes are called “European”.
Nomadic tribes, close to the Scythians in language and culture, occupied a much larger territory - the entire steppe belt from the Don to the Baikal region, including the foothills and mountain valleys of the Tien Shan, Pamir, Hindu Kush, Altai and Sayan. Recent excavations have found typically Scythian objects not only in Xinjiang, where this is not surprising, but also in the interior of China, Iran and Anatolia. Among the horsemen of the Asian steppes and foothills there were also many different tribes, the names of which are mentioned in various ancient sources. In Greek, Iranian and Chinese texts they were called “Sauromatians”, “Massagetae”, “Saki”, “Se” respectively. These are the “Asian Scythians”. Among the numerous finds in the mounds of European Scythia, along with objects bearing elements of Greek and ancient Eastern artistic traditions, one can also see a “purely” Scythian style, the same in its stylistic features as in the images found in Central Asia and South Siberia.
Since the Scythians led a nomadic or semi-nomadic lifestyle, the basic knowledge about their material culture was formed from the results of excavations of burial mounds, which are conventionally called “royal”, since it was in them that the most luxurious and precious things were found. The most striking and richest finds from Scythian and later Sarmatian mounds are presented in the Hermitage collection, which has been accumulated for more than 200 years. At first (since 1726) it was kept in the first Russian museum - the Kunstkamera, and since 1859, since the creation of the Imperial Archaeological Commission - in the Hermitage. Nowadays, ancient artistic objects of the Scythians and related tribes of the steppe Eurasia are in many other museums in Russia (in Moscow - in the State Historical Museum) and foreign countries. They are also kept in museums of Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, in museums of Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, China, Mongolia, in the USA (Metropolitan), in France (Guime, Saint-Germain en Lay), in England (British Museum) and in a number of private collections (for example, the A. Sackler collection in New York). Siberian museums store thousands of objects of Scythian artistic bronze, found at different times, starting from the 17th century. until today. Numerous gold and silver jewelry comes from Siberian burial mounds.
The most famous mounds are Chertomlyk (the right bank of the Dnieper) and Kul-Oba (Crimea). In each large Scythian mound, servants and concubines of the deceased were buried, as well as up to several dozen bridled and saddled horses. In one of the large mounds, about 400 horse skeletons, a whole herd, were found. A traditional “set” of personal jewelry of the leader, decorations of horses and weapons, and household items (in particular cups) was found in the mounds. Numerous and varied weapons were decorated with gold plates, with engraved images covering almost the entire surface of scabbards, quivers, handles, axes, etc. A characteristic feature of Scythian decorative and applied art is the dominance of the so-called “animal style,” where the full-blooded image of an animal was combined with an ornamental design of details.
For example, a find is considered unique - a cup from the Kul-Oba mound. A rounded electric goblet, decorated in the lower part with a typical Greek pattern, is covered in the upper half with images arranged in a circle, representing a kind of sequential visual narrative. There are seven figures of male Scythians on the goblet, six of them are arranged in three pairs, and one Scythian drawing a bow is shown separately. This emphasis allows us to see him as a central figure. Another bow hangs from his belt. Since the usual set of Scythian weapons included only one bow, the question immediately arises, what is the function of the second? In 1970, the famous Moscow Scythologist prof. D.S. Raevsky carefully examined different versions of the Scythian genealogical legend, fragments preserved in Greek and Latin texts. From these options, the following core plot of the legend about the origin of the Scythians emerged. In the mythology of every nation there is its own ancestor, usually a king. Among the Scythians, such an ancestor was King Targitai, born from the marriage of Heaven and Earth (a mythology common to all Indo-European peoples). He had three sons (also a very popular situation that turned into fairy tales): Kolaksai, Lipoksai and Arpoksai. Feeling the approach of old age and thinking about an heir, Targitai set a condition for his sons: the one who can string his bow and gird himself with the royal armor belt will ascend to the kingdom. The eldest son began to draw the bow, but the bow escaped from his hands and hit him in the jaw; The middle son's shin was damaged by a rebellious bow, and only the youngest son coped with the task and became king.
Conclusion
Art in the early stages of its historical development had not yet emerged as an independent sphere of human spiritual life. In primitive society there was only nameless artistic creativity that belonged to the whole society. It was closely intertwined with primitive beliefs, but was by no means determined by them. Primitive art reflected man’s first ideas about the world around him; thanks to it, knowledge and skills were preserved and passed on, and people communicated with each other. Art was associated with human labor activity. Only everyday work experience allowed the ancient masters to create works that not only went beyond their original purpose, most often cult, but also still excite us with the expressiveness of their artistic images.
Primitive art played an important role in the history and culture of ancient humanity. The human imagination has been embodied in a new form of existence - artistic. By consolidating his life experience and worldview in visible images, primitive man deepened and expanded his ideas about reality and enriched his spiritual world.
Having learned to create images (sculptural, graphic, painting), man acquired some power over time. Primitive art reflected man’s first ideas about the world around him; thanks to it, knowledge and skills were preserved and passed on, and people communicated with each other. In the spiritual culture of the primitive world, art began to play the same universal role that a pointed stone played in labor activity. The conversion of primitive people to a new type of activity for them - art - is one of the greatest events in the history of mankind.
Bibliography
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2. Larichev V. E. Cave sorcerers. – Novosibirsk: West Siberian Book Publishing House, 1980.
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5. Encyclopedia for children. T. 7, part 1. Art. Architecture, fine and decorative arts from ancient times to the Renaissance. - M.: Avanta+, 1999.
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