John Boardman here explores Greek art as a foreign art transmitted to the non-Greeks of antiquity--peoples who were not necessarily able to judge the meaning of Greek art and who may have regarded the Greeks themselves with great hostility. Boardman's pioneering work assesses how and why the arts of the Classical world traveled and to what effect, roughly from the eighth century b.c. to early centuries a.d., from Britain to China. Since the Greeks were not always the intermediaries and the results were largely determined by the needs of the recipients, this becomes a study of foreign images accepted or copied usually without regard to their original function. In some places, such as Italy, these images were overwhelmingly successful. In Egypt, the Celtic world, the eastern steppes, and other regions with strong local traditions, they were never effectively assimilated. Finally, in cultures where there was a subtler blend of influences, notably in the Buddhist east, the Classical images could serve as a catalyst to the generation of effective new styles. Boardman's approach is as much archaeological as art-historical, and the processes he reveals pose questions about how images in general are copied and reinterpreted. In addition, the author has demonstrated for specialists and for a broader audience that looking at Greek art from the outside provides a wealth of new insights into Greek art itself.

From one of the world’s leading authorities on ancient Greek art, a groundbreaking account of how Greek images were understood and used by other ancient peoples, from Britain to China In this book, acclaimed archaeologist and art historian John Boardman explores Greek art as a foreign art transmitted to the non-Greeks of antiquity—peoples who weren’t necessarily able to judge the meaning of Greek art and who may have regarded the Greeks themselves with great hostility. Boardman examines how and why the arts of the classical world traveled and to what effect, from Britain to China, from roughly the eighth century BCE to the early centuries CE. In some places, such as Italy, Greek images were overwhelmingly successful. In Egypt, the Celtic world, the eastern steppes, and other regions with strong local traditions, they were never effectively assimilated. And in cultures where there was a subtler blend of influences, notably in the Buddhist east, classical images served as a catalyst to the generation of new styles. Along the way, Boardman demonstrates that looking at Greek art from the outside provides a wealth of new insights into Greek art itself, and he raises important questions about how images in general are copied and reinterpreted.

Divides the ancient world into three broad climatic categories to offer insight into the way artists addressed key environmental challenges, in a lavishly illustrated and captioned reference that includes coverage of each global region and religion.

How did the statues of ancient Greece wind up dictating art history in the West? How did the material culture of the Greeks and Romans come to be seen as "classical" and as "art"? What does "classical art" mean across time and place? In this ambitious, richly illustrated book, art historian and classicist Caroline Vout provides an original history of how classical art has been continuously redefined over the millennia as it has found itself in new contexts and cultures. All of this raises the question of classical art's future. What we call classical art did not simply appear in ancient Rome, or in the Renaissance, or in the eighteenth-century Academy. Endlessly repackaged and revered or rebuked, Greek and Roman artifacts have gathered an amazing array of values, both positive and negative, in each new historical period, even as these objects themselves have reshaped their surroundings. Vout shows how this process began in antiquity, as Greeks of the Hellenistic period transformed the art of fifth-century Greece, and continued through the Roman empire, Constantinople, European court societies, the neoclassical English country house, and the nineteenth century, up to the modern museum. A unique exploration of how each period of Western culture has transformed Greek and Roman antiquities and in turn been transformed by them, this book revolutionizes our understanding of what classical art has meant and continues to mean.

A masterly investigation into the Classical roots of Western civilization, taking the reader on an illuminating journey from Troy, Athens, and Sparta to Utopia, Alexandria, and Rome. An authoritative and accessible study of the foundations, development, and enduring legacy of the cultures of Greece and Rome, centered on ten locations of seminal importance in the development of Classical civilization. Starting with Troy, where history, myth and cosmology fuse to form the origins of Classical civilization, Nigel Spivey explores the contrasting politics of Athens and Sparta, the diffusion of classical ideals across the Mediterranean world, Classical science and philosophy, the eastward export of Greek culture with the conquests of Alexander the Great, the power and spread of the Roman imperium, and the long Byzantine twilight of Antiquity.

Over 50 papers, first presented at the international congress ‘Greek Art in Motion’ (Lisbon, 2017) in honour of Sir John Boardman’s 90th Birthday, are collected here under the following headings: Sculpture, Architecture, Terracotta & Metal, Greek Pottery, Coins, Greek History & Archaeology, Greeks Overseas, Reception & Collecting, Art & Myth.

The Handbook of Greek Sculpture aims to provide a detailed examination of current research and directions in the field. Bringing together an international cast of contributors from Greece, Italy, France, Great Britain, Germany, and the United States, the volume incorporates new areas of research, such as the sculptures of Messene and Macedonia, sculpture in Roman Greece, and the contribution of Greek sculptors in Rome, as well as important aspects of Greek sculpture like techniques and patronage. The written sources (literary and epigraphical) are explored in dedicated chapters, as are function and iconography and the reception of Greek sculpture in modern Europe. Inspired by recent exhibitions on Lysippos and Praxiteles, the book also revisits the style and the personal contributions of the great masters.