- Hellenistic And Graeco-Roman Art
(By Roger Ling)Introduction
Hellenistic art is an unfashionable field. To the aficionados of the Archaic and Classical periods it seems a bewildering farrago of
divergent styles, at one extreme bloated and showy, at the other flaccid and derivative: it is almost as though Greek art, hitherto
carried forward in a relatively comprehensible and consistent pattern of development, loses its way and threshes around without a
sense of purpose. To the students of Roman art, with its clearer chronological framework and (in the mainstream at least) its firm
political thrust, the Hellenistic age is the shadowy and half-understood background out of which emerge the technical know-how and
many of the stylistic features which go into the making of the Roman state tradition. These attitudes of course do scant justice to the
achievements of Hellenistic art. The period 323-31 B.C. saw the creation of some of the greatest of Greek masterpieces-masterpieces
which have exercised considerable influence on the artists and art critics of recent centuries, especially the seventeenth and
eighteenth.
The main reason why Hellenistic art has been neglected, if not denigrated, is the difficulty of studying it. The new political situation,
in which Greek culture was brought into contact with various alien traditions and at the same time diffused over areas too vast for
effective communications to be maintained, inevitably led to regional variations: there is no single current that can be traced. More
serious are the problems of dating and attribution, due chiefly to the shortage of written evidence. After the comparative abundance
of literary and epigraphic testimonia for the Classical period, our sources for Hellenistic art are exiguous. The Elder Pliny,
previously our main support, provides no more than a few scattered and barely datable references for the 150 years between the early
third and mid second centuries B.C.; and fragments of Hellenistic authors quoted by Athenaeus in his Deipnosophistae (c. A.D. 200),
together with isolated snippets of information in the architectural treatise of Vitruvius and in the histories of Diodorus and Valerius
Maximus, do very little to fill the gap. Archaeological associations are also less helpful for dating than in the previous period. The
works of art which can be connected with precise historical events are few and far between: the Romans left very little behind when
they destroyed Corinth in 146, and it is not always clear whether the abandonment of buildings on Delos is to be attributed to the
sack by Mithridates in 88, to the pirate raid of 69, or to a later turn of events. There are in addition relatively few Hellenistic
buildings which are closely dated by inscriptions. Nor do any classes of Hellenistic ceramics supply dating evidence comparable to
that offered for previous centuries by Athenian black-figure and red-figure: only lately have more rigorous pottery studies sharpened
the cutting edge of this particular chronological tool.
All this has contributed to an inextricable confusion surrounding Hellenistic art; but nonetheless certain generalizations can be made.
First, the artistic centre of gravity in the Greek world shifted eastwards. While Athens remained an important focus of patronage and
production, the great centres of Hellenistic times were in Asia Minor and the eastern Mediterranean: Pergamum, Rhodes, Antioch,
Alexandria. Secondly, the type of patronage changed. Whereas in Classical times Greek artists had worked primarily for cities and
private citizens, now they found themselves receiving commissions from all-powerful kings and their ministers; and the old ideals of
civic pride and religious reverence which had inspired the great works of the Classical period gave way to the personal whims and
propaganda of the new ruling classes. These circumstances, combined with the development of science and humanism, account for
several aspects of Hellenistic art which will be illustrated below: the broadened range of subjects, a trend towards the secularization
of art, the emergence of academic and ostentatious work, generally the tendency of art to entertain rather than to elevate the viewer.
Ultimately, with the encroachment of Roman power upon the Greek stage, the focus of attention moved westwards and new patrons
appeared: the merchants, magistrates, and military potentates of Rome. This ushered in a new phase of classicism and eclecticism
and began the process whereby Greek artists were schooled to interpret the imperialist ideologies of the new world-power.
Architecture
In architecture the Hellenistic age saw an increased loosening of the rules which had governed Classical design, a fuller and more
flamboyant use of surface decoration, often at variance with the interior structure, a gradual development of new structural forms
and techniques, and the creation of the first truly homogeneous planned complexes in which each individual building was designed
to fit in the ensemble.
The rules of Classical design had centred upon the two architectural orders, Doric and Ionic. In Hellenistic times not only were the