Week 7: Winckelmann and Greek Statues.

Winckelmann was an art historian and anthropologist who studied the statues of Ancient Greece. He liked the pure white marble of the statues. He argued that the art of Greece embodied good taste. He said that the plain, pure white was the ideal beauty. Winckelmann felt that art should be plain and simple, and that color ought to have minor consideration in the role of the aesthetics of art.  He  promoted the idea of “good taste” and the idea that art should be simple and have very little extra parts to it.

However, He was basing his studies on the replicas in Rome and not on the real sculptures from Greece. These sculptures were white, and marble, but not exactly the same as the actual sculptures in Greece. For example, the Greek sculptures were painted. By studying these Roman-Greek sculptures, Winckelmann stayed firm in his statement that the art of Greece was pure and that the beauty of the whiteness was the basis of the beauty of art. However, the main difference of the two sets of sculptures is that the original Greek ones were once painted. This says that Winckelmann’s thoughts on the “pure” Greek sculptures were wrong. The art from Greece was not as pure as he thought it was, after all. They were actually almost completely painted. Art of Ancient Greece is known for being naturalistic and detailed. The proof that the Greek sculptures were once painted means that they were actually more detailed and naturalistic than previously thought.

I think that Winckelmann’s perspective on the Greek art isn’t that life altering, I’m sure that in the time, the idea of white, and purity was a popular idea and was easily relatable to the beliefs of Mother Mary. However, modern art is very colorful, and the idea of white being the basis of beauty is kind of lost now. Personally, I enjoy color. I like to surround myself with color and use bright colors in my own work. I also think that the current perception of color would not be so appreciated if Winckelmann’s perspective had not been made clear.

The Greek art as always been thought as being clean and pure. Even people today still think that the statues have always been clean white marble. I feel that if Winckelmann’s point of view hadn’t been so well known about the white statues being pure, more people would know and understand the statues being painted.

I, myself didn’t know that the Greek sculptures had been painted until recently. For me, it changes my perspective on the sculptures.  It made them seem more realistic, and more life like to me. Knowing the sculptures had been painted add a whole new level of detail and understanding to the way the Greeks saw the human form and how they wanted to display it.