The Sulture of Ancient Greece and Rome Against Medieval Culture

Ancient Greece and the Roman empire shared similar Mediterranean climates, and near-identical mythological beliefs: Multiple deities, fantastical odysseys of awesome physical and martial feats that inspired real artworks to express gesture, movement, and romanticize violence. Their lack of religious sexual repression leaves artists free to study proper anatomical measurements and express the beauty of nudity. Ancient Greece experimented prosperously with democracy, philosophy, and science, but eventually fell to war with the Macedonians, and relatively quickly ended up occupied by the Roman empire. With their authoritative governmental powers, the roman imperial mindset was often warlike, their leaders deified, and as such was the art that represented them. Both found their mediums in paintings, painted stone carvings, and architecturally favoring displaying their tall structural columns to create a sense of grandeur. They used marble, and limestone and the Romans developed concrete. An example of such a sculpture is the Augustus of Primaporta. It displays an anatomically realistic marble 3-d rendering of the famous emperor Augustus Caesar, in a powerful and graceful position enhanced by flowing cloth, a decorated cuirass, and a spear. He is confidently pointing forward in the direction he is walking to and is accompanied by a small cherub, imposing him further to the viewer. While Roman art was generally harshly realistic, Greek influences of idealism softened his skin in a more beautiful manner and decorated his clothing to a level usually reserved to divinity. It is almost guaranteed that this white statue would have been vividly painted in its depiction of Caesar, to a balance of accuracy and ideally portraying the emperor in his prime.

The middle ages were an arguably darker period in the display of humanity’s capabilities, dominated by sickness, northern European gloom, and turmoil comparably disappointing to the level of civilization shown in the roman and Greek times before. Christianity dominated, worshipping a single deity, all-powerful and all-important. The idea of individual worth was reset, democracy was long forgotten, and rhetoric of religious unification towards Christian worship was prominent in place of ponderous philosophy. Feudalist societies, as a result from the collapse of previous larger empires, also caused a reset in many aspects of technology and science, delaying the use of effectively realistic mediums and strong anatomical consistency that was used by the late Greeks and Romans. Christian worship caused lots of representation of the crucifixion, and churches were often built with the layout of a cross. Art essentially turned into a tool to decorate and celebrate Christianity: the beliefs of soul, afterlife, and resurrection cause most mediums to be found in and around the church, documenting the bible, and decorating saintly relics. Sexual repression turned the art of humanity towards celebrating the holiness of the soul, focusing on the beauty of narrative religious icons in preference to the natural human form. The 13th-century Byzantine panel painting Madonna and Child on a Curved Throne displays a stoic, melancholic rendition of Mary holding baby Jesus. The choices of line and shape display a preference to rigidity and strict balance between icons, rather than displaying an idealized exaggeration, definitely not reaching the status of the divine. Neither are the foreground characters displayed as ordinary, as implied by the halos, tasteful clothing, and odd ambiguous age of the child making his iconic 2 finger hand gesture. Two angels are at the top corners, onlooking with the same neutral expression the Madonna has towards her son: the only one with emotion is Jesus, staring directly at the viewer, all-knowing.

The ancient Mediterranean culture was a celebration of technology and might be balanced by philosophy, and their artistic style displayed that through a careful and realistic portrayal of their ideals. In contrast, medieval culture was a formation of powerful monotheistic religion, shunning the branching of philosophy, and so the Art styles were inexorably linked to Christianity.