do not really look down at the table but stare out
from the profile heads in the old manner. For all
his brilliance, Exekias was still wedded to many of
the old conventions. True innovation in figure
drawing would have to await the invention of a
new ceramic painting technique of greater versa-
tility than black-figure, with its dark silhouettes
and incised details.
BILINGUAL PAINTINGThe birth of this new technique came
around 530BCEfrom an artist known as the Andokides Painter,
that is, the anonymous painter who decorated the vases signed by
the potter Andokides.The differences between the two techniques can
best be studied on a series of experimental vases with the same com-
position painted on both sides, once in black-figure and once in the
new technique,red-figure.Such vases, nicknamed bilingual vases,were
produced for only a short time. An especially interesting example is
an amphora (FIG. 5-22) by the Andokides Painter that features
copies of the Achilles and Ajax panel by Exekias, his teacher.
In neither black-figure nor red-figure did the Andokides Painter
capture the intensity of the model, and the treatment of details is de-
cidedly inferior. Yet the new red-figure technique had obvious advan-
tages over the old black-figure treatment. Red-figure is the opposite
of black-figure. What was previously black became red, and vice
versa. The artist employed the same black glaze but instead of using
it to create the silhouettes of figures, the painter outlined the figures
and then colored the background black. The artist reserved the red
clay for the figures themselves. Interior details were then drawn with
a soft brush in place of a stiff metal graver, giving the painter much
greater flexibility. The artist could vary the thickness of the lines and
even build up the glaze to give relief to curly hair or dilute it to cre-
ate brown shades, thereby expanding the chromatic range of the
Greek vase painter’s craft. The Andokides Painter—many think he
was the potter Andokides himself—did not yet appreciate the full
potential of his invention. But he created a technique that, in the
hands of other, more skilled artists, helped revolutionize the art of
drawing.5-21Exekias,Achilles and Ajax playing a
dice game (detail from an Athenian black-figure
amphora), from Vulci, Italy, ca. 540–530 bce.
Whole vessel 2high; detail 8–^12 high. Musei
Vaticani, Rome.
The dramatic tension, adjustment of figures’ poses
to the vase’s shape, and intricacy of the engraved
patterns of the cloaks are hallmarks of Exekias,
the greatest master of black-figure painting.
5-22Andokides
Painter,Achilles and
Ajax playing a dice
game (Athenian
bilingual amphora),
from Orvieto, Italy,
ca. 525–520 bce.Black-
figure side (left) and
red-figure side (right).
1 9 high. Museum of
Fine Arts, Boston.
Around 530BCE, the
Andokides Painter
invented the red-
figure technique. Some
of his early vases are
“bilingual”—that is,
the same scene appears
on both sides, one in
black-figure and one
in red-figure.1 in.1 in.Archaic Period 115