197 



PAINTING. 



PAINTING. 



198 



is evidently deserving of little attention. Cleanthes of Corinth is said 

 to have made the first outline ; Ardices, of the same city, and Tele- 

 phanes of Sicyon, to have introduced some lines within the figure ; 

 and Cleophantus to have coloured it with a single colour, and thus 

 produced monockromata. Corinth was the great centre of the ceramic 

 art, and these frequent references to Corinthian painters point with 

 sufficient distinctness to the early connection between the potter's art 

 and painting. The legend of Cleophantus, or Eucheir and Eugram- 

 mus, having accompanied Demaratus from Corinth to Italy (Olymp. 

 30, B.C. 657), probably points to the early connection of Greek and 

 Italian art, or to the taste for the former which existed in Etruria and 

 the neighbouring countries, as is sufficiently attested by the innu- 

 merable vases with Greek stories and Greek inscriptions now found in 

 Italy. The grotesqueness and clumsiness of the figures on the earlier 

 vases, and their progressive improvement, show how little ground 

 there U for the notion that the proportions of the human figure in 

 early Greek art were fixed by some type derived from Egypt or else- 

 where, instead of gradually developing themselves as the culture of 

 the race advanced 



The very curious paintings on the walls of the Etruscan tombs 

 should here be mentioned; and Pliny speaks of ancient works 

 existing in his time in a temple at Ardea, as well aa at Caere and 

 Lanuvium. 



Between the 50th and 80th Olympiad (from 580 to 460 B.C.) painting 

 advanced considerably in Greece. 



Historical pictures of very early events are recorded, one indeed by 

 Eularchus, in the reign of Candaules, who died 01. 16. 1, B.C. 716. 

 Cimon of Cleonac invented catagrapha, that is, figures seen obliquely 

 from above or below, and thus applied the rules of perspective. The 

 peculiarities of drawing of this early period are beat learned from the 

 study of the ancient vases ; the forms and protuberance of the muscles 

 are exaggerated, and the positions strained and whimsical. 



!' i . ^notusof Thasos, who probably settled at Athens about 01. 79. 2 

 (B.C. 463), was the first painter of great excellence, and the founder 

 of what may be cilled the Athenian school. Aristotle (' Poet.,' vi. 

 calls him a-yaftfs rieoypAQos, " successful in his expression of character ; " 

 and speaks of him as painting men better than they are. The 

 characteristic of his style was elevation and largeness of design, with 

 purity of form and force of expression. Pliny speaks of him as having 

 abandoned the old stiffness, and having given movement to the 

 features. His transparent drapery ie also mentioned. Pausanias 

 (x., 25-31) describes his pictures in the Lesche at Delphi the Capture 

 of Troy, the Departure of the Greeks, and Descent of Ulysses to the 

 Shades. In the Pcccile at Athens his works stood by the side of the 

 Battle of Marathon by Pana-nus, the nephew or brother of Phidias, 

 and of the Combat between the Athenian* and the Amazons by Micon. 

 This latter artist, together with Ouatas of ^Egiua and Dionysius of 

 Colophon, were the most celebrated contemporaries of Polygnotus. 



The principles of light and shade were investigated by Apollodorus 

 of Athens about the 94 01. (B.C. 404). To the school of Athens 

 succeeded what may be termed that of Ionia, in which illusion seems 

 to have been more aimed at. This we may infer from the well-known 

 story of the grapes of Zeuxis and the linen cloth of Parrhasius. 

 Zuuxis, with whom begins the second epoch of the more advanced art, 

 was of Heraclea, and flourished about Ol. 94. (B.C. 404). His excel- 

 lence seems to have been equally conspicuous in female beauty (as the 

 Helen of Crotona), and the sublimity of Zeus and his attendant gods ; 

 whilst in technical skill he surpassed all his predecessors. 



Parrhasius was of Ephesus, and he is no less celebrated for the 

 roundness and relief of his figures than for their exquisite form and 

 expression. His contemporary Timanthes overcame him in one of 

 those contests between painters which were not unfrequent in Greece, 

 ami which are said to have been first instituted at Delphi in the time 

 of Pamcnus. Among the ancient paintings from Pompeii is one of the 

 lame subject (the sacrifice of Iphigenia) as that of Timanthes, 

 mentioned in Pliny, and in which the grief of the father is represented 

 in the fame way by the concealment of the face. 



Another school arose at Sicyon, in which the most celebrated names 

 were Euiihranor of Corinth (Ol. 104-110, B.C. 364-340), Pausias of 

 Sicyon (Ol. 103, B.C. 368), Aristeides of Thebes (OL 102-112, B.C. 372- 

 33*), and Pamphilus of Amphipolis (01. 97-107, B.C. 392-352). The 

 first of these, a sculptor as well as a painter, was laborious and con- 

 sistently excellent in all that he undertook. Aiisteides was remarkable 

 for his expression of passion ; Pausias practised encaustic painting 

 with great success, having acquired the art from Pamphilue. Pausias 

 was noted for his children and lighter subjects, and first decorated 

 roofs and arches with figures. Pamphilus succeeded in establishing a 

 knowledge of the rudiments of drawing as part of a liberal education. 

 He was moreover the teacher of Apelles, who united the softness and 

 colouring of Ionia with the science of the Sicyonian school. His 

 excellence in female beauty was attested by the Aphrodite Anadyomene 

 at Cos ; his power in sublime subjects and his technical skill, by the 

 Alexander wielding the Thunder at Ephesus. The liberality of 

 Apelles first brought into notice a rival of his fame, Protogenes of 

 Hhodea, or rather of Caunus in Caria. This artist excelled in a 

 laborious study of nature, and Apelles declared that his own superi- 

 ority over Protogenes consisted in his knowing when to leave 

 off. They both executed numerous portraits, and Apelles was 



honoured with the exclusive privilege of painting Alexander the Great. 

 Nicomachus probably preceded Apelles; he seems to have rivalled 

 Luca Giordano in quickness of execution. Nicias of Athens, Theon of 

 Samos, and Melanthius were contemporaries of Alexander. The first 

 of the three was excellent in light and shade, and painted battles and 

 historical subjects on a large scale. 



From the death of Alexander, and as a consequence partly of the 

 political disturbances which followed, the decline of painting was con- 

 tinuous. Painters indeed met with ample encouragement, but they 

 worked for private rather than public enjoyment, and their attention 

 was directed mainly to a lower class of art, to that which could be 

 produced rapidly for the glorification of kings and rulers or the gratifi- 

 cation of the affluent. Instead of representations of the gods, and of 

 the great events of epic verse or Hellenic history, works of the class 

 we now call genre, low and domestic subjects (rhypography), and even 

 pornography (obscene pictures), were eagerly sought. These last 

 became more general as the art fell lower, and painters sought popu- 

 larity by novelty of style and familiarity of subject, or gain by making 

 their art the creature of luxury and sensuality ; but even Parrhasius 

 was noted for pictures of a libidinous character. Vase-painting 

 gradually died out in this period; but, on the other hand, mosaic 

 was introduced, and acquired great popularity, and Greek musivarii 

 were in much request for the preparation of mosaics for Rome. 

 Landscape-painting was likewise introduced late, and never flourished 

 among the Greeks, though the art was cultivated by Greek painters 

 for the gratification of their Human employers. 



Some time before the spoliation of Greece, Greek painters had 

 migrated to Rome and found employment there. But as the plunder 

 of the Grecian cities by the Roman generals went on, the passion for 

 works of art among the Homans seemed to increase ; and as the love of 

 art, or the power of rewarding its professors, declined in Greece, 

 Grecian artists betook themselves in constantly increasing numbers to 

 the Roman capital, so that about the end of the republic Rome was 

 spoken of as full of them. Many migrated also to Egypt and Asia, and 

 elsewhere, until such Grecian painters as were left were to be sought 

 anywhere rather than in their native country. 



Instead of tracing further the decay of the art, it may be well to 

 speak briefly of the kinds of painting practised and the materials 

 employed whilst Greek painting was in its maturity. The earliest 

 occupation of the painter in Greece, as in Egypt, seems to have been 

 in colouring sculpture ; and from the gaudy daubing of the primitive 

 wooden figures of the gods, down to the refined tinting of the most 

 exquisite statues of the greatest of the Greek sculptors, this was 

 always regarded as a branch of the painter's art. Praxiteles himself, 

 according to the well-known story, when asked which of all his statues 

 he preferred, replied, ' That in which Nicias had a hand " Nicias 

 being one of the most eminent painters of his time. What this 

 circuniJitio, as Pliny terms the statue-painting of Nicias, really was, 

 will be considered under another head. [PoLTCHROMY.] Another of 

 the branches of the art for which the painters were always famous- 

 that, namely, of vase-painting will also be noticed more conveniently 

 elsewhere. 



The pictures ordinarily painted by the Greeks up to an advanced 

 stage of the art, appear to have been almost exclusively easel pictures 

 executed in tempera. They were painted chiefly on wooden panels, 

 which had probably been prepared with a gesso ground ; but paintings 

 were also executed on stone, plaster, parchment, and, though not till a 

 late period, on canvas. Glue or size, white pf eggs, and gum were the 

 vehicles commonly used in mixing and applying the colours. Wax was 

 also used, boiled with mastich or mixed with a mineral alkali, so as to 

 be employed as a water-colour medium. The application of wax by 

 means of fire, or encaustic painting, was of later introduction ; for 

 though practised by Pausias, who is said to have learned the method 

 from 1'amphilus, it was not generally adopted till about the time of 

 Alexander. [ENCAUSTIC PAINTING.] Fresco-painting was also of late 

 introduction, but in the later stages of the art was, either alone or in 

 conjunction with encaustic, much employed in paintings on walls and 

 ceilings, and generally in works of a decorative character. Vitruvius 

 says that the Greeks attained such skill in the preparation of fresco 

 walls, that, in his time, people were accustomed to cut slabs from 

 them, which could be packed up and carried to any distance. The 

 finer fresco-paintings, according to Vitruvius and Pliny, were, when 

 finished, covered with an encaustic varnish, which heightened and 

 preserved the colours. Oil as a vehicle appears to have been unknown. 



The four colours which were the basis of the colouring of the Greeks 

 down to the time of Apelles were 1, white, Melian earth, or, more 

 rarely, cerussa, white lead; 2, red, rubrica from Cappadocia, called 

 sinopis; 3, yellow, sil, &xP a > froln tne Attic silver-mines; 4, blacks 

 (probably including blues), atramenta, fi*\ai>, from burnt plants or 

 ivory. These were the " colorei austeri" to which were afterwards 

 added the brighter and more expensive colours, " floridi," which were 

 usually furnished to the painter by his employer; but the palette 

 - always to have been restricted to a comparatively few well- 

 chosen and carefully-prepared colours. This restriction to a few 

 colours was one of the things which satisfied Sir Joshua Reynolds an 

 indisputable authority in a question of colour of the superiority of 

 the Greeks as colourists. Another, was their use of atramentum. 

 " What disposes me," he wrote (Note xxxvii. to Du Fresnoy), " to 



