Severe style Totally Explained

Everything about The Severe Style totally explained

The Severe style, or Early Classic style, was the dominant idiom of Greek sculpture in the period ca. 490 to 450 BCE. It marks the break down of the canonical forms of archaic art and the transition to the greatly expanded vocabulary and expression of the classical moment of the late 5th century. It was an international style found at many cities in the Hellenic world and in a variety of media including; bronze sculpture in the round, stelae, and architectural relief. The style perhaps realised its greatest fulfilment in the metopes of the Temple of Zeus, Olympia.
The term "severe style" was first coined by Gustav Kramer in his Uber den styl und die Herkunft der bemahlten griechischen Thongefasse (1837, Berlin) in reference to the first generation of red figure vase painters, the name has since Vagn Poulsen’s 1937 study Der strenge stil become exclusively associated with sculpture.

Development

There is no firm chronology for the Severe style, the dating of early 5th century BCE sculpture is approximate and consequently its first appearance has been conjectured to be at some point between 525 and 480 BCE.The one exception to this general rule of uncertainty is the Tyrannicide group; a replacement for the bronze created by Antenor in 514 to commenorate the assassins of the tyrant Hipparchus was sculpted by Kritios and Nesiotes and dated in an inscription of 477/6 BCE. This piece, now known only from Roman copies preserves the poses and facial features familiar from archaic art and combines it with a novel treatment of multiple viewpoints, feeling for mass, and anatomical observation that distinguishes it as one of several Athenian transitional works. Another is the Kritian boy, c. 480 BCE whose distribution of weight onto one leg, lowered right hip, and inclination of head and shoulders exceeds the formulas of the late Archaic kouroi marks a step toward the greater naturalism and individualisation of the Classical – as B. S. Ridgway puts it: no longer a type but a subject.
   The depredations of war and the sumptuary laws of Solon ensured that very little sculpture was practiced at Athens in the first half of the 5th century, instead we've to look to others cities to trace the development of the Severe style. We can observe the general characteristics of the period on its greatest masterpiece the Temple of Zeus, Olympia, attributed to the Olympia Master. Here we find a simplicity of forms, especially in dress and the absence of decoration, a feeling of heaviness both in the gravity of the body and the “doughy” cloth of the peplos. Indeed this era sees a shift from the use of the Doric chiton to the Ionic peplos whose irregular groupings and folds better express the contours of the underlying body. We can also witness on the pediments of the temple the slight pout typical of this time where the upper lip projects a little over the lower and a volume to the eylids, a striking departure from the fixed Archaic smile of the 6th century and suggestive perhaps of the brooding pathos also typical of the idiom. There is further experimentation with the expression of emotion on the metopes of the temple depicting the labours of Herakles, an experiment not pursued by later Classical art.
   Of the Severe artists whose names have come down to us there are in addition to Kritios and Nesiotes already mentioned also Pythagoras, Kalamis and most notably Myron. The latter, a native of Eleutherai, was a late practitioner of the style active in the 450s and 440s and the author of two identifiable sculptures that have survived in copies: his Discobolus and the Athena Marsyas group. Both seemingly original in composition, these works capture several of the chief characteristics of the style in its feeling for the dramatic moment, its rhythm and balance of masses, and the embodiment of feeling through the pregnant gesture.
   Why this naturalising trend should emerge in early 5th Century Greek art has been a matter of much scholarly speculation. Renate Thomas summarises the contending views thus: The significance of the Late Archaic period remains unclear. Is it already a response to the awakening sense of personal value, which will then be held back during the Sever Style through a self-imposed discipline (Schefold), or has there developed, since the Late Archaic period, a new and freer spirit, which, however, becomes clearly visible only in the Severe or even in the Classical style (G. v. Lucken, E. Langlotz, B. Schweitzer)? Did the “Discovery of the Mind” in the sixth century produce two different effect (Schachermeyr), one of which produces new sets of laws through reflection upon traditional norms? Or does only the strong freedom of movement in the figurative art of the Late Archaic period, the self-confident recognition of personal individuality, go back to a change in the sixth century, while the causes of the “purified world of forms” of the Severe Style are others?

List of works

Kritios Boy c.490-80 (Athens 3938)
Blonde Boy c.480 (Athens 689)
Euthydikos Kore
Pediment of the Temple of Aphaea, Aegina
Aderno athlete
Metopes of temple E at Seinus
Dodona Zeus
Motya charioteer
Herm of Pindar
Guistiniani Hestia
Bronze Head c.460 (Athens 6590)
Bronze athlete c.470 (Mt Holyoke Coll. BOI.I.1926)
Bronze athlete holding ball c.460 (Berlin misc.8089)
Woman from Xanthos c.460 (London B318)
Persepolis Penelope c.460 Tehran
Head of Penelope (copy of above) (Copenhagen 1944)
Reconstruction of above (albeit withwrong head) Vatican 754
Paros Nike c.470-60
Aegina Sphinx c.460

Lemnian Athena

Mourning Athena

Zeus Ganymede group

Themistokles Herm

Diskobolos

Alxenor Stele,

Acropolis Athena

Athena Giustiniani

Charioteer of Delphi

Taranto goddess

Head of Athena from Aegina c.460-50 (Paris 3109)

"Leonidas" c.475 (Athens 3613)

Bronze Poseidon from Kreusis c.460 (Athens Br. 11761)

Bronze head from Porticello c.450 (Reggio)

Acropolis relief c.480-70 (Athens Acr. 577)

Reliefs from the Passage des Théories, Thasos c.470 (Louvre)

Banquet relief from Thasos c.460 (Istanbul 578)

Metrological relief c.460 (Oxford L.1.73)

Nisyros stele c.460-50 (Istanbul 11)

Tyrannicides,

Cape Artemision Zeus

Athena and Marsyas group,

Temple of Zeus Olympia,

Choiseul-Gouffier Apollo

Riace Warriors,

Omphalos Apollo

Sounion Stele,

Dove Stele,

Giustiniani Stele

Borgia stele c.470 (Naples 98)

Pharsalos stele c.470-60 (Paris 701)

Phalanna stele c.460 (Larisa)

Vonitsa stele c.460 (Athens 735)

Delphi stele c.470-60

Aegina stele c.450

Thebes stele c.480-70 (Boston 99.339)

Ludovisi Throne

Kassel Apollo

Parthenon metopes

Chatsworth Head

Mantua Apollo (copy) orig. c.460 (Naples 831)

Tiber Apollo (copy) orig. c.450 (Rome Terme 608)

Eros Soranzo (copy) orig. c. 460 (St. Petersberg 85)

Perseus head (copy) Rome Conservatori

Heracles (copy) orig. c.450-40 (Oxford 1928)

Ludovisi peplophoros (copy) orig. c. 470-60 (Rome Terme 8577)

"Aspasia" (copy) orig. c.460-50 (Berlin (E) K.166+167:605)

Chiaramonti relief (copy) orig. c. 470-60 (Vatican)

Further Information

Get more info on 'Severe Style'.

External Link Exchanges

Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:

<a href="http://severe_style.totallyexplained.com">Severe style Totally Explained</a>

Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned.