Underworld painter
The underworld painter was an Apulian vase painter and an important representative of the rich style of Lower Italian vase painting . His works are dated to the second half of the 4th century BC. Dated.
The underworld painter is considered to be the successor of the Darius painter , in whose workshop he began his career and which he either later took over or at least helped to shape as an influential craftsman. He got his emergency name from a name vase on which he shows Hades and Persephone in their palace in the underworld. The stylistic closeness to the Darius painter is shown by three very large lekyths (around 95 cm high), which are considered the painter's early work. The image compositions and the mythological content are very close to those of the Darius painter, and the rendering of robes and faces is reminiscent of him. They all show the same theme, kidnappings: Hades kidnaps Persephone, Eos kidnaps Cephalus and the Dioscuri Kastor and Pollux kidnap the daughters of Leucippus . With the first two vases he is quite free in his representation, he distributes the figures on different levels and separates them by tendril friezes. The third vase includes a further thematically matching picture, which is unique in its kind in vase painting: the Dioscuri fight against the sons of Aphareus . His early work also shows influences from the painter of Louvre MNB 1148 .
Often the underworld painter overdoes it with the decoration, so that the vases look a bit overloaded. In addition, he sometimes has problems with the representation of faces, so that his people often appear grumpy. He gets along better with the muscles of naked men, which are tight and body-hugging. This is reminiscent of Hellenistic sculptures . However, the legs he paints are often quite thin. He attaches great importance to some details. So he carefully draws hair and patterns clothes quite intensively. The underworld painter is less original in his repertoire than the Darius painter, but he also shows a few rarely depicted stories such as the Melanippe myth from two dramas by Euripides . This story has not yet been found on any other vase. Also known are three volute craters from the Berlin Collection of Antiquities , the ( Gigantomachie crater , the Priamiden crater and the Persephone crater ).
The artist's late work is viewed quite critically and a rapid decline in the painter's skill is assumed. There are no explanations for this, but it is possible that it is no longer the work of the underworld painter, but that of other painters in his workshop.
literature
- Arthur Dale Trendall : red-figure vases from southern Italy and Sicily. A manual. von Zabern, Mainz 1991 ( cultural history of the ancient world, vol. 47), ISBN 3-8053-1111-7 (especially p. 107f.)
Web links
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Underworld painter |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Underworld Painter |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Apulian vase painter |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 4th century BC Chr. |
| DATE OF DEATH | 4th century BC BC or 3rd century BC Chr. |