A historical view of artist creations and influences

¶ … artists creations. I NEED TO STRESS THAT THIS ASSIGNMENT WILL BE SUBMITTED

My apologies for the delayed response; I just now saw this request.

The instructions state that the paper is to be 750 words, which is why I wrote that amount.

They also state that the only source to be used is the YouTube one you provided of Soltes' lecture, which is why I assumed you would know what the Works Cited were. Here is the one source that you requested in the instructions.

Soltes, Ori. "Continuity and Transformation -- What is Art. www.youtube.com 2011. Web. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfxSp_4SZII

I hope this is not too late to help.

There were several ways that Geometric Greek art evolved into Classical Greek art, the culmination of which is perhaps evinced in the artwork decorating the Parthenon. The key word in explaining this phenomenon is evolution, because there was not necessarily a direct alteration in the approaches to artwork from these periods, but rather a progression or a transformation as Soltes explained. The lineage of Classical Greek art is directly traced to Geometric Greek art and the traditions which the former encompassed. This degree of continuity is evinced in the first two works of art that Soltes shows -- the first of Hetaera who is a female in a symposium reclining while she is entertained by what the lecturer (Soltes) terms as dancing girls. The second image he shows is of Dionysus in a scene which decorated the Parthenon in which the Greek God of wine and pleasure is depicted as reclining in a similar position as that of Hetaera. However, Dionysus is rendered observing the birth of Athena, whereas Hetaera and the works from the period in which this work was constructed, is reclining for the sake of a decadent (literally) pleasure.

The evolution of Geometric Greek art to Classical Greek art also pertained to the reason for the existence of the art. Prior to the period of Classical Greek art (which dates approximately from the 6th to the 4th centuries, B.C.E.) art was generally created for fundamental religious reasons and principles. However, this tendency of Greek art had shifted by the point of the classical period because there was a greater interest in the works of art, which inspired the spirit of creating art simply for the sake of art. Thus, there is a dichotomy at play within this evolution which goes from the sacred to the profane, or what the Soltes refers to as sacer and profanus.

The social and historic events which presaged or which were a part of this evolution are widely evinced in the state of the city of Athens. During the period of Classical Greek art, Athens made its own transformation from a traditional aristocratic model of government to a democracy -- which is one of the first times in the history of the city that such a transformation had been made. Due to the structure of the democracy, people from different parts of this city-state -- those from the city proper and those from by the river, for example -- now had to find means of relating to one another. One of the ways that they did so was through art. Additionally, Athens' eventual success in overthrowing the Persian invasion led by Xerxes contributed to the social and political climate in which the city swelled with hubris, which affected changes in its art.

Additionally the evolution of Geometric Greek art to that of Classical Greek art is demonstrable via the terms of ethos and pathos. In the vast majority of Geometric Greek art, the figures were relatively staid and embraced facial expressions of a sort of benign ethos -- which is a facial expression decidedly removed from the moment. In artwork from the classical Greek period, however, there is frequently a juxtaposition of ethos with pathos, the latter of which is an engaged expression and positioning in which the subject is certainly within the moment. This facet of the evolution is perhaps best evinced in the work in which Heracles is combating a lion. In this work, Heracles represents ethos whereas the lion represents pathos.