Greek art today is not in any way what it was a few milenia ago. Greek art has gone through many different phases. People are mostly familiar with ancient Greek Art. Nevertheless, Byzantine art is also amazing. Modern Greek artists have come way as well. Greek art was pretty, so the argument went, but Etruscan art was simple and austere. For proof the Etruscan partisans pointed to the vases then were being excavated in Italy.The Greece-versus-Rome debate was not a sectarian academic quarrel; much of its vitality was supplied by architects and collectors. Greek art was not based on abstract aesthetic principles unrelated to time and place. The very significance of Greek art is to be found in its fidelity to contemporary life. Greek art was essentially focused on the representation of the naked human body. This seems somewhat surprising to us and one can only wonder if the Greeks concept of ‘original sin’ and the awareness of shame attached to nakedness was foreign to the Greeks.
Greek art was the work we’ve just seen spread from the coast Anatolia and all the Islands of the eastern and central Mediterranean. The variation of the regional style are all subsumed, but “influence” or provinciality, to the metropolitian center. Greek art was able to evolve only from Greek mythology, but it continues to stir and excite us, even though Greek mythology has lost all real meaning for us, apart from a historical one. The best proof that in art this theory operates essentially with an extra aesthetic moment is provided by the fate that befell Russian symbolism, the theoretical premises of which fully coincide with the theory under investigation. Greek art was alive and gives life. In contrast, the Egyptians’ interest was in the dead. Greek art was definitely more reflective of the ancient Greek women than renaissance art was of renaissance women, but Greek art cannot be assumed to be an accurate representation of Greek women. Greek art was developed through several cultural phases, geometric, archaic, classical, and Hellenistic. Geometric was characterized by the use of geometric shapes; the archaic style developed from the use of oriental motifs. Greek art was a truly “living“ thing.
Ancient Greek artists were obsessed with the human form, not with Nature?s chaos. It was about falling in love with the human form. Greek art was at all times very much alive, and the student must be prepared to find exceptions to any formula that can be laid down. The date above suggested for the beginning of the period with which we have first to deal must not be regarded as making any pretense to exactitude. Greek art was perfect, he argued, because it was true to nature. Ancient art serves as a useful tool to help historians decipher some important aspects of ancient culture. From art we can determine the basic moral and philosophical beliefs of many ancient societies. Ancient Roman coins served many purposes for the rulers of the different periods. The production of ancient silver coins or gold coins allowed them to establish a monetary society. Ancient Greek paintings have unfortunately not survived long. You can find only a few examples of Greek paintings on terracotta and on tombs and walls. Ancient Greek art was related to animal form and the skills to show beauty, poise, musculature and anatomically right proportions. Ancient Roman art showed Gods as ideal humans with distinguishing characteristics. Ancient literary interest in statues – their theft, ownership, and restitution – reflected a deep, pervasive, cultural respect for statuary. This respect included recognition of a spectrum of potency for images of gods and significant humans, from the merely decorative to the potentially numinous, a vehicle for divine manifestation and communication of divine will. I really dont know what else to write about Ancient Greek Art.