Callixenos (sculptor)

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Kallixenos ( ancient Greek Καλλίξενος , Latin Callixenus ) was an ancient Greek ore caster who lived around the middle of the 2nd century BC. Was active.

No known works by Kallixenos have come down to us. He owes his position as part of art history to a mention by Pliny the Elder , who, together with Antaios , Callistratos , Polykles from Athens , Pythocles , Pythias and Timocles, placed him as an important artist of the 156th Olympiad (156 to 153 BC). During this time, after a phase of decline, their works are said to have helped art to find new ways and flourish, in particular they are said to have given ore casting a new lease of life after a weaker phase. They should no longer have reached the level of the earlier high phases, but still have created respectable works of artistic value. Pliny does not explain exactly where the artistic boom of the works lies, nor does he name individual works. From the context, however, it can be concluded that it was evidently a group of artisans, possibly based in Rome, from whom a new classical movement of Hellenistic art originated. In making this assessment, Pliny follows a different, Hellenistic source. These names form the end of Pliny 's chronological listing of the important sculptors and ore founders. As is customary with Pliny, the order also reflects a qualitative evaluation, starting with the best and ending with the supposedly weakest of these ore caster. Callixenus was in the middle of the seven with Pliny.

It is possible that Kallixenos is identical to the writer Kallixeinos of Rhodes , who wrote a book about painters and sculptors, which was the model for the work of a Zographon , which in turn was used by the author Sopatros of Paphos for his work.

literature

Remarks

  1. Pliny: Naturalis historia. 34, 52