vase painting in its outlined forms, flat areas of
color, and schematic approach to space. Despite
this, Polygnotos was an ambitious artist who was
versed in many techniques, and his grand masterpiece
was a vast mural cycle at Delphi representing
Odysseus’ descent into the Underworld.
Classical Period Fresco Painting, Parthenon, Athens,
5th c BC]
It was Apollodoros in the Classical Period
who invented skiagraphos, which means “to
shade”. It is he who thrust Western painting onto
a long road which would reach its climax twenty
centuries later in the work of Caravaggio, the
ultimate “shadow” artist. This movement towards
shading propelled art on a radical path whereupon
it would give sculptural and three dimensional
form to the figure, and bridge the gap between the
painterly imagination and optical reality. Changing
times required new media to reflect the shifting
landscape of artistic evolution, and encaustic was
a medium that aptly found a new central role. Apollodoros’
invention created a ripple effect in which a
chasm developed, causing a division in art which
lingers to this day—the eternal debate and tension
between form and color, pathos and ethos, line
and chiaroscuro .
The real moment where encaustic would
take center stage was at the end of the Classical
period and the beginning of the Hellenistic period,
when a great school flourished on the Peloponnesus—Sikyon.
I had the privilege of visiting the site
this past summer with my wife. This city, which was
one of the oldest in Greece, became the equivalent
of a Florence, Paris, or New York, in antiquity. It sits
upon a hill overlooking the strait which separates
Peloponnesus from the mainland. There was a
great school of painting, and it is said that competition
was tremendous to enter, and if one was
accepted, one faced paying tuition not unlike what
today’s college students face. Eupompos, one of
the first “celebrity” teachers, charged a talent per
year at the academy, which was the equivalent of
$20,000. Considering that in ancient times people
did not have the same resources as today, that
sum of money was a huge sacrifice for any family
sending their child to be educated. Eupompos was
the radical educator. He was one of the crucial
figures that lifted art from being a manual craft
to a higher sphere of intellectual and philosophical
pursuit. He developed a program of instruction
that encompassed not only mastery of materials,
drawing, painting, anatomy, subject matter, etc,
he also enveloped his students in, what we would
consider today, a liberal arts or “Renaissance”
learning atmosphere. Arithmetic, logic, geometry,
grammar, and many of the disciplines associated
with a classical education were an integral part
of the Sikyonian school’s program. If this was not
enough, Eupompos also saw to drawing being an
integral part of the education of free schoolchildren
all throughout Greece. It was no longer craft;
it had become part of a well-rounded, enlightened
education.
Sikyon today
Out of this brilliant school came some of
the greatest names of Greek art. Today they are
unknown, but in antiquity they had a celebrity status
rivaling or surpassing that of Picasso or Warhol. Pliny
states that certain paintings sold for the prices of
entire cities, and in Roman times coveted masterpieces
brought from Greece were hung in public
places and were almost considered sacred. These
paintings became so famous that a whole business
was born which has uncanny parallels to today’s
poster business—master artisans would propose to
wealthy Roman patrons to recreate famous Greek
masterpieces in their villas, which would be part of
Francisco Benitez
Featured Artist
7
Spring
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