Looking at Greek Art

Description

Looking at Greek Art by Mark D. Stansbury-O'Donnell offers a practical guide to the methods for approaching, analysing and contextualising an unfamiliar piece of Greek art. It demonstrates how objects are dated and assigned to an artist or region; how to interpret the subject matter and narrative; how to reconstruct the context for which an object was made, distributed and used; and how we can explore broader cultural perspectives by looking at questions of identity, gender and relationships to surrounding cultures. Each section focuses on different theoretical approaches, providing an overview of the theories, key terms and required evidence. Case studies serve to demonstrate each process and some key issues to consider when using a given approach. This book explores a variety of media, including terracotta, metalwork and jewellery, in addition to works found in major museum collections in the United States and Europe.

Mark D. Stansbury-O'Donnell is a professor of art history at the University of St Thomas in St Paul, Minnesota. He is the author of Pictorial Narrative in Ancient Greek Art (Cambridge University Press, 1999) and Vase Painting, Gender, and the Social Identity of Archaic Athens (Cambridge University Press, 2006). He has published in the American Journal of Archaeology and has contributed to several other books on Greek art and vase painting.

'Stansbury-O'Donnell's book will give students of Greek art a good sense of the range of interpretive tools they have at their disposal; it will also, I suspect, help more experienced researchers to identify the weak points in their own mastery of method and theory.' Bryn Mawr Classical Review