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Karen Siwak
History of Art to 1300 (ART 2211)
Presented by PERSON for COMPANY
“Grave Stele of a Little Girl” is a stone sculpture carved from marble in one piece of a young girl who stands in a relaxed, contrapposto stance, holding two sleek, yet simplistic doves. The girl gazes serenely and peacefully at her birds.
These birds may have been her pets because one of the doves is touching her lips with its beak.
These birds may have been her pets because one of the doves ...
The little girl wears an unbelted peplos that falls ...
The little girl wears an unbelted peplos that falls in gentle drapes on her body and her feet rest on sandals that may be missing straps to secure them. Her hair is elaborately waved, partially pinned up and partially falling down over her shoulders.
A stele was a stone slab, either decorated or undecorated, commonly used as a tombstone or grave marker.
Those who had died were represented on the stele (like the one to the right) as they had been in life so they would not be forgotten.
Although this stele is not painted now, we can assume the paint has long since faded, but it would have been brightly colored at the time of its creation like the example below. Popular colors were bright shades of red, black, blue, and green.
The doves may just have been the girl's pets. Another theory is that because doves could fly, they were a connection to death and the afterlife. Like the souls of the dead, doves were able to travel to the underworld and would continue to act as pets to comfort and entertain the lost loved one.
This piece was found in 1785 on the island of Paros, a part of the Cycladic Islands in the Aegean Sea. It was created about 450–440 B.C.E., during the Classical Period when artists at the time tried to create idealized human bodies that were proportionate and poised.
Families made up the foundation of Greek society. Young girls were often cared for by a nurse, spending most of their time in the gynaikon, where the women’s quarters were housed. Girls’ education consisted of dancing, gymnastics, music, as well as spinning, weaving, cooking and other domestic tasks.
Prominent families who wished to honor the memory of their deceased would commission a stele to place in their walled burial plots facing the street where travelers to Athens would be impressed by the images in their idealized roles.
Had the Persians not attacked in 480 B.C.E., this period (in which beautifully proportioned pieces and grand structures were created) may not have occurred. The attack led to the creation of the Delian League and the Athenian general Pericles’ use of public money to fund the rebuilding of Athens.
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