Attica red-figure column krater by Manieristi indeterminati

Manieristi indeterminati

Attica Red-figure Colum Krater

alt 33,5 x diam 29,6cm

Date: 460-450 b.C.
Medium: attic red-figured pottery

Introduction

This beautiful vase called a krater is a large container used in ancient Greece during symposia - banquets attended only by men - to mix wine with water. Stylistically, there
are many differences between the two painted sides, both in taste and in the rendering of details. For this reason, the decoration cannot be attributed to a single artist but to a group, called the Manieristi Indeterminati, in which it is difficult to identify the identity of each individual artist. In the world of the ancient Greeks, beauty, represented on side A of the krater, was very important as it drew attention to one's own person. On vases, scenes in which women take care of their bodies are very common. The female figures depicted on the krater are probably etere, a term referring to friends and companions, who were often foreigners or slaves. They were the only women allowed into exclusively male social events. In Greek society, they were meant to give pleasure to men with their bodies and arts and, for this reason, enjoyed greater freedom than wives. Ethereas were one of Greek society's responses to the need to satisfy feelings, intellectual affinities or physical needs not possible with marriage, a purely formal agreement between father and groom. The only important purpose was the procreation of legitimate children who could inherit and maintain the family heritage.

The work is located at Gallerie d'Italia - Napoli.

This beautiful vase called a krater is a large container used in ancient Greece during symposia - banquets attended only by men - to mix wine with water. Stylistically, there
are many differences between the two painted sides, both in taste and in the rendering of details. For this reason, the decoration cannot be attributed to a single artist but to a group, called the Manieristi Indeterminati, in which it is difficult to identify the identity of each individual artist. In the world of the ancient Greeks, beauty, represented on side A of the krater, was very important as it drew attention to one's own person. On vases, scenes in which women take care of their bodies are very common. The female figures depicted on the krater are probably etere, a term referring to friends and companions, who were often foreigners or slaves. They were the only women allowed into exclusively male social events. In Greek society, they were meant to give pleasure to men with their bodies and arts and, for this reason, enjoyed greater freedom than wives. Ethereas were one of Greek society's responses to the need to satisfy feelings, intellectual affinities or physical needs not possible with marriage, a purely formal agreement between father and groom. The only important purpose was the procreation of legitimate children who could inherit and maintain the family heritage.

The work is located at Gallerie d'Italia - Napoli.

The krater is of the columnar type: it has the distinctive feature of two vertical cylindrical handles at the sides, which, starting at the bottom, join at the top to the projection of the large lip.

The vase has decorative elements, such as ivy leaves and tongues, on the lip, shoulder, foot and around the main scenes painted in the central area of the body, on the front and back. The vase has a reddish-purple base covered with an engobe, the very thin layer of purified clay used to paint the vase before putting it in the kiln, which is pinkish orange in colour. The unpainted areas of the vase are covered with a low-shine black paint.

The front depicts three female figures arranged around a large louterion, a stone basin usually used for body washing and toileting. The large basin, in the form of an elongated half sphere arranged horizontally, rests on a support that ends at the top with an Ionic capital.

Painted horizontally on the basin, in capital letters, is the word kalos , which means beautiful in Greek, and the same word is written vertically on the support.

The woman depicted in the act of bending over the basin is pulling forward a thick lock of curly hair, while she holds a comb with her right hand. The right thigh is marked by a horizontal mark. This is a webbed ornament, a strip of thin ribbon used by women of the time as a contraceptive amulet.

Behind her, another shorter-haired woman dressed in a chiton, a long dress worn without a belt, is depicted in the act of handing something to her companion, perhaps a ribbon or bandage. The object was probably originally painted cold, after the vase was fired, and is therefore no longer visible today as it has been lost.

On the right a third female figure has been painted with her hair gathered up in a sakkos, a kind of embroidered cap In her left hand she is holding a pointed boot, probably a symbol related to the erotic sphere.

On the back of the vase a scene that could be interpreted as a sacrifice has been depicted. In the centre, in profile, a large heifer fills almost all the space allocated to the depiction. It has a horn on its forehead and its legs are moving, as if it were advancing. Behind it, a young man in profile, with his face turned towards the heifer, is accompanying it towards the place intended for sacrifice