Works of Art
Etruscan Black Figure Lekythos with Dolphins
Period: Etruscan, last third of the 6th century B.C.
Culture: Etruscan, Iberian, Sardinian
Category: Array
Dimensions: Height:13.5 cm.
Price: CHF 34500, USD 34500
Provenance:
Ex-L. Mildenberg collection, Switzerland.
Condition: The vessel is whole and very well preserved, but the upper part presents some repairs. The terracotta is rosy beige; the painting, still retaining parts of its original luster, varies from black-brown to lighter brown. Purple highlights decorate the dolphins and the floral motif.
Description
This form of lekythos - of reduced size and with a rounded body, known as a shoulder lekythos - was probably created in Attica in the late first half of the 6th century B.C.: the workshop of the Amasis painter, one of the most famous Athenian artists of the black figure period, may have been the creator of this variant.
This piece is the only known Etruscan version.The decoration is organized in two friezes: a narrow one, on the shoulder of the vase, is composed of an uninterrupted garland of pomegranates; the other, on the belly, depicts two groups of dolphins, painted on both sides of a vegetal motif. The dolphins are represented in a playful and natural attitude: they have jumped out of the water and are falling back into the sea, their muzzles directed towards the black-painted zone, which would indicate the surface of the water.
The meaning of this piece may be connected with the funerary sphere: on the one hand, the lekythos is a receptacle designed to contain the oils that one uses during the funeral ceremonies and rites. On the other hand, the represented subject is, especially in Etruria, often related to the death sphere: the dolphin is interpreted as an intermediary between life and the afterlife.
Stylistically, the very lively drawing of the animals recalls the Ionian works of the Archaic period, but the naïveté of the details refers more to the Etruscan productions of the last decades of the 6th century. One thinks, in particular, of personalities close to the workshop of the Paris painter, like the Tityos painter, the Amasis painter, the painter of Silena or the artist known as the painter of the National Library 178.
Bibliography
Published:
KOZLOFF A.P., More Animals in Ancient Art from the L. Mildenberg Collection, Part II, Mayence/Rhin, 1986, n. 71.
Parallels:
HANNESTAD L., The Paris Painter, Copenhague, 1974.
HANNESTAD L., The Followers of the Paris Painter, Copenhague, 1976.
MARTELLI M. (éd.), La ceramica degli Etruschi, La pittura vascolare, Novara, 1987, p. 31ss.