Week 5-Unknown art pieces

This week we were given two unknown pieces of art to determine whether they are from the Cycladic, Mycenaean, or Minoan cultures.

First here’s a quick overview of the three cultures art, Cycladic art commonly consisted of figurine sculptures made of marble. The sculptures were mostly made to represent females, that were nude, with folded arms across there chest. It is thought they used bright paints to finish off these pieces. Mycenaean art commonly show hunting themes and battles with warriors. They show people as looking cartoon-like. Mycenaean art is filled with distinct shapes, like pots being small at the bottom and large at the top, and crater shapes to hold liquids. Minoan art consisted of animals, components of nature, flowers and things to show naturalistic designs. They also used vibrant colors and smooth lines.

The first unknown piece is the pot. I believe this pot to be from the Mycenaean culture. The pot starts out very small at the bottom and then gets larger and larger as it goes up to the top. The pot is also wide so it showing the “crater shape,” which they were using for liquids like water. The pot also has a picture on it that shows warriors heading off to battle. Two of the warriors are on a cart being pulled by an animal, and they are painted to look like cartoon characters which is common of the Mycenaean art.

The second unknown piece is a painting of a man holding two bunches of fish. I see this piece fitting best into that of the Minoan art. The piece shows a man that is naked, and this is part of Minoan art because they were demonstrating nature. Also supporting the naturalistic theme is the bunches of fish. The picture also consists of curved lines and linear structure. The picture seems to be of a fisherman and he has caught a great deal of fish, which shows power and strength. The man has greyish hair that could show wisdom and knowledge, justifying why he has caught so many fish. Power and knowledge/strength were also something the Minoan culture showed through their art pieces. And a final factor leading me to believe this piece is from the Minoan culture is that it has strong vibrant colors, the red in the man and the blues of the fish are deep rich colors.  

Ziggurats and Pyramids of Giza

Reading about these two significant structures expanded my knowledge about how big our world really is. Personally I have not gone to vacation anywhere outside of our country, so topics like this are very interesting to me.  This week’s topic is about the Ziggurats and the pyramids of Giza.

These two structures being from different countries actually have some interesting similarities to them. Both the Ziggurats and the Pyramids of Giza are man-made structures built upwards instead of wide. Elevation was done to preserve the structures from flooding and weather damage. They both are a place that holds symbolic pieces of the cultures of the people. Both structures utilize stairs due to the high structure of the buildings and add stability.

Although these two structures have some similarities they are yet very unique in their own way. For example, the Ziggurats were used as shrines and were thought of as the bridge to travel from earth to heaven. They were sometimes called “house of the mountain” and “bond between heaven and earth.” The pyramids of Giza served as tombs for the three fourth dynasty kings. The largest pyramid was named after the King Khufu, the middle sized one is after King Khafre, and the smallest, which is significantly smaller than the rest, is after King Menkaure. The largest pyramid was 13 acres across the base, and the limestone caused the pyramid to reach almost 481 feet in height.

The pyramids of Giza were created with a great amount of math skill and critically planned to perfection. They were made to follow the suns path. They also had to know how to have the land just perfect and level to where all the stones would align just right in order to have the stones meet perfectly at the top. They uncovered the work station of the workers of the pyramids that demonstrated the difficulty and intensity of the labor going into these structures. Their tactics included things like hauling stones weighing two plus tons by rolling them over logs or sliding them across muddy grounds. I find it interesting that it is still unknown exactly how the pyramids were built. The text talks about how it is assumed that a ramp was made around the pyramid to put the higher stones in place. Unlike the perfection in building the pyramids, the Ziggurats were built on top of rubble of previous buildings and then repeated eventually raising up the level of them which helped to prevent flooding. The Ziggurats were not as carefully planned or thought out as well as the creators of the pyramids of Giza.

In conclusion, I find these structures very interesting due to their significance and their uniqueness in their influence on religion to the cultures beliefs and rituals. I personally enjoyed reading and studying about the pyramids of Giza the most due to the way they were created and how much thought and work went into the building of these structures.

Week Three Art Post

               

              This piece of art from 1350-800 B.C. and is called a tray with miniature animals and vessels, it was from Iran in the Iron Age I-II. The sculpture is made of clay and it is 6.5 centimeters in hieght, and 23.1 centimeters wide, with a 14.8 centimeter diameter.

My first reaction when I saw this piece of art was how it has to do with the wildlife of animals. The types of animals that I see is African native animals. The snouts on the animals made me think that they are lions. I also see a third type of animal  which the head is located on the side of the tray.  The body of the third animal that I mentioned looks like is the whole tray and the legs look like they are part of the tray as well. The color of this tray makes me think that they are in a dry dirt dessert since it is brown and white. For that reason I feel like these animals have pots almost like they have water in them and the lions are very thirsty. The animal on the far looks bigger so in my opinion it looks like a male while the animal closest to the camera looks much smaller and looks like a female. 

                I think this tray was used for many reasons including a plate, or a place to set small tools. It could be a plate that someone of high importance ate off of, like a king or tribe leader. I think that someone higher up would have been the one to eat off of this because it is so well done and probably like what we view china dishes as today. And the pot like things, on the edge of the sculpture could be used to hold side dishes or they could have been used as cups for liquids. It also shows that it could have been used by someone of a leadership role because the animals that are touching the small pots almost look like bulls guarding the cup. This would resemble power and strength because this animal is seen as strong and fierce, so it would be like how kings and royalty have used lions as a symbol of power but with a bull.

                The composition of this art piece is fairly simple. All three of the animals are facing one direction. The animals and the pots are all placed on one side of the sculpture, leaving the other side just flat and bare.

                The medium of this piece was said to be made out of clay. And the color is just a brownish white, which makes sense with the color in the animals and the theme they are trying to portray.

The style is unique in that the animals were made to seem as though they are guarding the pots or some kind of entrance of the tray.

                The line of this piece is interesting; the main part of the piece is curved with a dip in the middle, as if to hold food on it.

                The texture looks smooth and bumpy in certain areas. The top of the animals, the top of the tray, and sides of the pots are all made smooth by the sculptor. The sides of the dish and the feet it has to stand on look more rough and bumpy, which was probably done on purpose to add texture and a different look to the piece.

                For the proportion one of the animals looks smaller than the other, but I am not sure if this is just due to the camera angle or if it is actually like that. Also the animals are way smaller than the pots, and to me the animals look like bulls which are very large compared to most pots we have today, so maybe the sculptor was trying to show the large size of these pots. Or it could be to show that it is designed to be a grand entrance of some sort, because usually entrances are distinguished with pillars or tall statues or something.

                Overall, I find this piece interesting due to being so small, so expensive, so old, and the significance it may hold to other cultures.