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Classical statues were not painted horribly

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Re: Classical statues were not painted horribly

#191

Post by [deleted] »

CGMthrowaway wrote: post #82
numlocked wrote: post #3

Good read! The idea that these marvels of artistry were painted like my 10th birthday at the local paint-your-own-pottery store always seemed incongruous, at best. > Why, then, are the reconstructions so ugly? > ...may be that they are hampered by conservation doctrines that forbid including any feature in a reconstruction for which there is no direct archaeological evidence. Since underlayers are generally the only…

> The idea that these marvels of artistry were painted like my 10th birthday at the local paint-your-own-pottery store always seemed incongruous, at best. Have you seen medieval art though? https://www.artistcloseup.com/blog/explaining-weird-mediaeva... The technique is quite different from the "old masters" of later periods that we often think of as fine art.

[deleted]

Re: Classical statues were not painted horribly

#193

Post by buescher »

WorldMaker wrote: post #158
buescher wrote: post #14

I think the best explanation is that classicists are not makeup artists. I am reminded of reading some classicists' attempt to create garum in the kitchen by making some unpleasant horror of mashed fish or something back in the eighties or nineties. No one ever mentioned in those kinds of write-ups back then that they still make fish sauce in Italy. (I looked for the source I'm thinking of and it's drowned out by mor…

There was a similar, maybe apocryphal, story recently of academic archaeologists stumped about an ancient tool until a person pulled out a crochet kit to fidget with their hands near the exhibit and it became obvious that it wasn't a lost tool they just hadn't put it in the right context.

That's the roman dodecahedrons that are a bit more mysterious than that - the "this is for knitting gloves" explanation is a real stretch, and not only because the Romans didn't have knitting.

Re: Classical statues were not painted horribly

#194

Post by renewiltord »

I think this is just one of those instances where historians go for “most justifiable” vs. “most likely”. E.g. all dinosaurs were stretched skin, fatless, featherless because that’s the minimum thing that fits the evidence.

Likewise, where there is paint these guys have recreated it so. But over time we will find that there were more layers more likely to fail over time and so on.

Re: Classical statues were not painted horribly

#195

Post by [deleted] »

CGMthrowaway wrote: post #82
numlocked wrote: post #3

Good read! The idea that these marvels of artistry were painted like my 10th birthday at the local paint-your-own-pottery store always seemed incongruous, at best. > Why, then, are the reconstructions so ugly? > ...may be that they are hampered by conservation doctrines that forbid including any feature in a reconstruction for which there is no direct archaeological evidence. Since underlayers are generally the only…

> The idea that these marvels of artistry were painted like my 10th birthday at the local paint-your-own-pottery store always seemed incongruous, at best. Have you seen medieval art though? https://www.artistcloseup.com/blog/explaining-weird-mediaeva... The technique is quite different from the "old masters" of later periods that we often think of as fine art.

[deleted]

Re: Classical statues were not painted horribly

#196

Post by marcellus23 »

CGMthrowaway wrote: post #82
numlocked wrote: post #3

Good read! The idea that these marvels of artistry were painted like my 10th birthday at the local paint-your-own-pottery store always seemed incongruous, at best. > Why, then, are the reconstructions so ugly? > ...may be that they are hampered by conservation doctrines that forbid including any feature in a reconstruction for which there is no direct archaeological evidence. Since underlayers are generally the only…

> The idea that these marvels of artistry were painted like my 10th birthday at the local paint-your-own-pottery store always seemed incongruous, at best. Have you seen medieval art though? https://www.artistcloseup.com/blog/explaining-weird-mediaeva... The technique is quite different from the "old masters" of later periods that we often think of as fine art.

The medieval period is different from the classical period. There's no reason to compare to medieval art when we have other examples of classical art that we can compare to.

Re: Classical statues were not painted horribly

#197

Post by rootusrootus »

So do not repaint them. We see that often with far more recent examples of collectible items -- clean it up and repaint it and the value tanks, even if the original is in terrible shape. If a statue is so priceless that we cannot tolerate a modern artist's skilled take on how it should look, then just leave it be.

Re: Classical statues were not painted horribly

#198

Post by throwthrowuknow »

bjt wrote: post #134
resize2996 wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is how scholarship works. It’s like a math proof: they’re interested in proving the base case. If someone else wants to do more speculative work to theorize what a well-painted version would look like, that would be super cool, but it wouldn’t be scholarship.

And that's a fine standard to maintain when you're writing an academic paper. When you are instead putting together a museum exhibition intended for the general public, and you observe over and over again that they will interpret your work as representing what the statues actually looked like, it is irresponsible to keep giving them that impression. It's not an either/or question. They could do some of the statues wi…

Imagine if we refused to publish any material or exhibit recreations of dinosaurs because the only evidence we have are fossilized skeletons and a few skin texture impressions.

Re: Classical statues were not painted horribly

#199

Post by marcellus23 »

jtr1 wrote: post #149
arrrg wrote: post #78

Did he talk to people who make those reconstructions? Why speculate from that outside perspective when you could talk to people who worked on them and the decisions they made. I think that would be very interesting. As is that‘s completely missing and it feels a bit like aimless speculation and stuff that could be answered by just talking to the people making those reconstructions. My experience is that people doing…

The ending of the article left me feeling he had more of an axe to grind here. The mostly unspoken ideological background is that classical art is often appropriated by proponents of Western chauvinism to demonstrate their supposed innate cultural superiority. Poorly painted reconstructions undermine that image, but it does not mean this was done intentionally. I agree that a more neutral observer would have been int…

> Poorly painted reconstructions undermine that image, but it does not mean this was done intentionally

If I'm understanding you right, you're suggesting the author thinks that researchers are intentionally doing poor constructions to undermine public perception of classical art as part of some sort of culture war? I don't see anything in the article to suggest this

Re: Classical statues were not painted horribly

#200

Post by nyeah »

joefourier wrote: post #187
nyeah wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but medieval European art generally sucked. (Call this a hypothesis if that helps.) Compare the damn cave paintings of buffalo to most medieval European art. Some of the 10k-year-old stuff is much better observed. Europeans between about 500 and 1300 mostly couldn't paint. I'm sorry about that. It's just not always taste. Sometimes it's taste. Sometimes people are bad at making art.

If you think medieval artists lacked skill, check out Villard Honnecourt’s sketchbook, especially the insects on folio 7 and Christ in Majesty on 16: https://www.medievalists.net/2024/12/sketchbook-villard-honn... Medieval art is very stylised, but the quality of the lines, the details in the clothes, the crispness of the composition, all that requires a lot of skill. Check out Jean Bondol’s work for instance https:/…

Ok, but the Honnecourt sketches are kind of strong. Not professional by today's standards, but decent. I'd be happy to have done them--but I'm not an artist. The tapestry can be appreciated, like Klimt's 2-D-ish stuff can be appreciated. The style is fine. It's not fantastic work, I wouldn't hang it up, but it's reasonably accomplished.

In general, though, yes, I think medieval European artists were short on skill compared to artists from Europe in pre-medieval and post-medieval times, and art from other places between ~500 and ~1300. They had some skill, but not as much.

Artists with limited technique are a real thing. Not everything is taste or style.

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