A superb catalogue of Greek, Hellenistic and Roman sculpture displayed in the National Archaeological Museum in Athens containing some of the finest art works of the ancient world.

This brief guide informs the reader about the collections of the National Archaeological Museum and the wealth and variety of its exhibits, which span the long history of the ancient world. Rather than giving detailed descriptions of the various items on display, it gives general information about all the collections, with an emphasis on the way they are presented in the rooms of the Museum. At the same time it illustrates works which are representative of each collection and which bear witness to the artistic quality and value of the exhibits in the largest and most important museum in Greece.

This catalogue contains all the sculptures on display in the National Archaeological Museum. Every entry is supplemented by a full bibliography and is written clearly so as to be readily understood not only by experts but also by the general reading public. A useful short introduction, written for non-specialists, offers readers an overview of ancient Greek sculpture from the Archaic period to the end of Antiquity.

For the general public and specialists alike, the Hellenistic period (323–31 BC) and its diverse artistic legacy remain underexplored and not well understood. Yet it was a time when artists throughout the Mediterranean developed new forms, dynamic compositions, and graphic realism to meet new expressive goals, particularly in the realm of portraiture. Rare survivors from antiquity, large bronze statues are today often displayed in isolation, decontextualized as masterpieces of ancient art. Power and Pathos gathers together significant examples of bronze sculpture in order to highlight their varying styles, techniques, contexts, functions, and histories. As the first comprehensive volume on large-scale Hellenistic bronze statuary, this book includes groundbreaking archaeological, art-historical, and scientific essays offering new approaches to understanding ancient production and correctly identifying these remarkable pieces. Designed to become the standard reference for decades to come, the book emphasizes the unique role of bronze both as a medium of prestige and artistic innovation and as a material exceptionally suited for reproduction. Power and Pathos is published on the occasion of an exhibition on view at Palazzo Strozzi in Florence from March 14 to June 21, 2015; at the J. Paul Getty Museum from July 20 through November 1, 2015; and at the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, from December 6, 2015, through March 20, 2016.

Figural and non-figural supports are a ubiquitous feature of Roman marble sculpture; they appear in sculptures ranging in size from miniature to colossal and of all levels of quality. At odds with modern ideas about beauty, completeness, and visual congruence, these elements, especially non-figural struts, have been dismissed by scholars as mere safeguards for production and transport. However, close examination of these features reveals the tastes and expectations of those who commissioned, bought, and displayed marble sculptures throughout the Mediterranean in the Hellenistic and Roman periods. Drawing on a large body of examples, Greek and Latin literary sources, and modern theories of visual culture, this study constitutes the first comprehensive investigation of non-figural supports in Roman sculpture. The book overturns previous conceptions of Roman visual values and traditions and challenges our understanding of the Roman reception of Greek art.

In 1928, and again in 1937, parts of a large-scale bronze horse and nearly complete jockey were recovered from the sea off Cape Artemision in Greece, where they had gone down in a shipwreck. These original Hellenistic sculptures, known together as the "Horse and Jockey Group from Artemision," are among the very few surviving bronze sculptures from antiquity. Seán Hemingway has been allowed by the National Museum in Athens to investigate the horse and jockey statuary group as no one ever has before, and in this book, combining archaeological and art historical methods of investigation, he provides the first in-depth study of this rare and beautiful monument. New technical analyses of the statues by Helen Andreopoulou-Mangou form an appendix to the volume. Hemingway begins with an introduction to Hellenistic bronze statuary and what we know about this extraordinary class of ancient sculpture. He then recounts with riveting detail the discovery and painstaking restoration of the statue group, describing the technique of its creation and carefully reviewing scholarly knowledge and speculation about it. He also provides a valuable compendium of what is known about ancient Greek horse racing, the most prestigious and splendid of all Greek sports. After a full consideration of all the available evidence, he speculates further about the work’s original meaning and function. His study provides a glimpse of the excellence achieved by Hellenistic bronze sculptors, and it will become the definitive resource on this unique sculpture from ancient Greece.

The Parthenon sculptures in the British Museum are unrivaled examples of classical Greek art, an inspiration to artists and writers since their creation in the fifth century bce. A superb visual introduction to these wonders of antiquity, this book offers a photographic tour of the most famous of the surviving sculptures from ancient Greece, viewed within their cultural and art-historical context. Ian Jenkins offers an account of the history of the Parthenon and its architectural refinements. He introduces the sculptures as architecture--pediments, metopes, Ionic frieze--and provides an overview of their subject matter and possible meaning for the people of ancient Athens. Accompanying photographs focus on the pediment sculptures that filled the triangular gables at each end of the temple; the metopes that crowned the architrave surmounting the outer columns; and the frieze that ran around the four sides of the building, inside the colonnade. Comparative images, showing the sculptures in full and fine detail, bring out particular features of design and help to contrast Greek ideas with those of other cultures. The book further reflects on how, over 2,500 years, the cultural identity of the Parthenon sculptures has changed. In particular, Jenkins expands on the irony of our intimate knowledge and appreciation of the sculptures--a relationship far more intense than that experienced by their ancient, intended spectators--as they have been transformed from architectural ornaments into objects of art.