The Classical Revolution Treasures of Ancient Greece


The Classical Revolution

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In August 1972, a holiday-maker from Rome

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was snorkelling off the southern coast of Italy.

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At a depth of about seven metres,

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he saw what he believed was a human hand sticking out of the seabed.

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When he touched it, he realised it was the hand of a statue.

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There was another buried nearby.

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When the statues were hauled up to dry land,

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it was plain that he'd discovered something amazing -

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two perfect, life-sized Ancient Greek bronze warriors.

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These two magnificent bronze warriors are unmistakably Greek.

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Naked, athletic, sensuous male bodies,

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with an aura of heroism and grandeur.

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Staggering workmanship, total mastery of technique.

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And they were made nearly 500 years before Christ,

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when our ancestors in Britain were still living in wooden huts.

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Yet what is even more astonishing is that just one generation earlier

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sculptures like these simply weren't possible.

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Greek artists weren't capable of producing such top-quality,

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closely observed works of art.

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And then, suddenly, they were.

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So how did the Ancient Greeks get so good so fast?

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In the 5th century BC,

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something extraordinary occurred in Greece

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that would change the course of Western culture.

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This was the golden age of Classical art.

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A time of dazzling advances in technique,

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from casting in bronze...

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..to carving in marble.

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From painting to pottery.

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At its heart was a passion for the human figure

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and a new sense of what art could do.

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We're still feeling the effects of what happened here

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2,500 years later.

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The art of Classical Greece coming, it seems, out of nowhere

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is more dazzling, more realistic and more beautiful than ever before.

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It's been called the Greek Revolution.

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But how and why did that revolution happen?

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The answer is more surprising, much stranger

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and more exciting than we imagine.

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These are the remains

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of some of the finest temples in the Ancient Greek world.

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But they're not in Greece, they're in Sicily, at Agrigento,

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in the so-called Valley of the Temples.

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Once, they formed part of one of the most powerful cities

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in the Greek world.

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A world that extended further and further beyond the shores of Greece.

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The Greek philosopher Plato

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once compared the independent communities of Greeks

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scattered along the shores of the Mediterranean

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to "frogs around a pond".

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By the 5th century BC,

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Greece was not so much a country in the modern sense

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as an extensive network of hundreds of rival colonies

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and powerful city-states,

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all of them trading, bickering,

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but also sharing vital customs, attitudes and religious beliefs

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as well as language.

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The Greeks at Agrigento were proud of their city.

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They built no fewer than seven monumental temples,

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dedicated to different gods, overlooking the sea.

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Around the sides of temples like these,

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Greek craftsmen carved scenes from the lives of the gods.

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But in the 5th century BC they began to do things very differently.

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A visit to the archaeological museum in Palermo

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gives you a sense of how radical that change was.

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Here's the old way of doing things.

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This relief from a temple nearby shows Zeus, the king of the gods,

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in the shape of a bull, carrying off the beautiful Europa

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with whom he has fallen in love.

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It was carved in the 6th century BC, around the year 550.

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Like a lot of Greek art at this time,

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the scene is presented in a strong yet simple fashion.

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The figures occupy the same plane

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as the surface of the original block of stone

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and almost everything is presented in profile.

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Except for the bull's head, which is turned impossibly to the front.

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To modern eyes, art like this can look naive, even primitive.

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The shapes are blocky and crude

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and though poor old Europa's being dragged away by force,

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there's precious little emotion on her face.

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Then just 100 years later and the stone leaps into life.

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In this temple relief, something really remarkable is happening.

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It depicts a moment from a very grisly myth,

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when the hunter Aktaion is torn apart by his own hounds

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after offending the goddess Artemis.

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Aktaion is bowing his head, succumbing to this brutal fate,

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as one animal already crunches its jaws into his side.

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And on the right, semi-throttled by Aktaion,

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while still clawing at his shoulder and his flank,

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is this bravura piece of carving,

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a frenzied, sharp-fanged hound,

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imagined at the maximum moment of bloodlust,

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one aerodynamic ear flattened by the speed of his attack.

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What we're witnessing

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is a sharp contrast with the art of 100 years before -

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movement, psychological tension, expression, and a sense of drama.

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Just what caused this shift

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is a question that has challenged art historians for centuries.

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One motivating factor was undoubtedly competition,

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the fierce desire of the Greeks in places like Sicily

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to outshine rival city-states in the wider Greek world

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in art, in building, at athletic competitions.

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One activity brought out this competitive streak like no other.

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This little silver coin gives us a clue.

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It dates from around 470BC and it's from this part of the world -

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the western colonial frontier of Ancient Greece.

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It shows a charioteer competing in one of the games.

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He's wearing an ankle-length robe and he's driving these horses.

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We know they must be thoroughbred racing horses because they have

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beautifully elegant, thin legs and these manicured manes.

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Four-horse chariot racing was the most prestigious and expensive sport

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of the Ancient Greek athletic games.

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It's been called the Formula 1 of its day.

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And Sicilian rulers were obsessed with it.

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They loved to compete but, even more, they loved to win

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and they recorded their victories on coins like these.

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It was a simple but ostentatious way of signalling their elite status,

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showing off that they were more Greek

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than the Greeks back home in the old world.

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The tiny island of Motya lies off Sicily's western coast.

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In 1979, archaeologists made a discovery here that laid bare

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that spirit of creative competition.

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They found a work that, in the 5th century BC,

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dramatically raised the bar of artistic ambition.

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Only one word begins to do justice to the effect of this sculpture -

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swagger.

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We are looking at an aristocrat and an athlete,

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probably a victorious charioteer.

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He's fully aware of his vigour,

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his physical power and sexual charisma.

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He's revelling in his recent triumph.

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As a figure, he's dripping with attitude and brazen self-display,

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like a strutting peacock.

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And, like a peacock, he is something of a dandy.

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Because, artistically,

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the secret weapon of this statue is what he's wearing -

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this high-belted, diaphanous robe,

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shrink-wrapping his still-sweaty muscles

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and revealing every last contour and swelling,

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leaving very little indeed to the imagination.

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All those swooping, darting, sinuous folds and crinkles,

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which have been carved

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with such a breathtaking new naturalism and subtlety

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so that they cascade down his body with the ease of water,

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they all caress and, therefore, emphasise his form,

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like underlining the most important passages in a book.

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This is no god but a wealthy, successful individual,

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one with the money to pay an artist for something very special.

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Victory statues like this

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would spur Greek sculptors to push their skills to the limit

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In terms of art history,

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the Motya charioteer seems to have come out of nowhere -

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this glorious apparition, a messenger

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announcing the sudden victory of the revolution with a flourish.

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Once announced, there could be no going back.

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Greek art would be fired into striving

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for greater and greater realism...

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..and a new sense of dramatic possibility.

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There are many possible causes for the Greek Revolution,

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but one of the strongest candidates has to be technique.

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The question is - did Greek artists begin to create lifelike images

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simply because they wanted to?

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Or did new techniques encourage artistic experimentation?

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What's certain is that in the competitive atmosphere of the time,

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new ways of creating art were developing at astonishing speed.

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Take a remarkable technique that was perfected sometime around 500BC.

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A way of casting life-size statues in bronze

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known as the lost wax technique.

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-Hello. Alastair.

-Vassilis.

-Vassillis, hi.

-Petros.

-Petros.

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Great to meet you both.

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'Vassilis and Petros have agreed to show me

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'how to make a bronze statue the Ancient Greek way.

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'First, the statue is modelled in clay

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'and encased in plaster to make a mould.'

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Part of the mould comes off quite easily. Very easily.

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'Inside the mould is the imprint of the statue.'

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You've made your model with clay, you've got all of your moulds,

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what's the next part of the process?

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TRANSLATION:

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'This plaster cast will be used to make a hollow wax statue.

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'The wax is poured out,

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'leaving a film of wax clinging to the inside of the mould.

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'When the model has set,

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'the mould comes off to release the hollow wax model inside.'

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So...now we have one wax warrior,

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and he's hollow.

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Amazing. It's really very ingenious indeed.

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'The hollow wax figure will be filled

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'with sand and plaster to make a solid core inside.

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'A second mould, in plaster, is made to encase the model.

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'When it's fired in a kiln, the wax melts away,

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'leaving a thin, statue-shaped cavity between the two moulds

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'and into that cavity goes the molten bronze.

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'It is then left to cool.

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'After a couple of hours, the mould is chipped away

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'and the sculpture revealed.

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'Finally, it can be cleaned and polished,

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'the end of a long and sometimes uncertain process.'

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The whole process, this bit, is unbelievably dramatic!

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Do you still find it very exciting to watch it?

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Though the process looks complicated, the technique is a gift to artists.

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Bronze is a much more fluid and forgiving medium than marble,

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and better suited for achieving tiny, refined details on the surface,

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so it allowed sculptors to experiment and innovate like never before.

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Some time in the 5th century BC, the Ancient Greeks

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took bronze casting to a dazzling new level of artistry.

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For proof, let's look again at those enigmatic figures

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found on the seabed some 40-odd years ago.

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If the Motya charioteer is a tease,

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then these warriors are a revelation.

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The best works of art have a palpable charisma.

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Sometimes it's hard to explain why,

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but you know it when you see it

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and these two have got that X-factor.

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The details of both sculptures are extraordinary.

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Veins snaking across muscles,

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intricate locks of curling hair...

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..copper nipples,

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copper lips with silver teeth...

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..and those inlaid eyes with delicate foil lashes.

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And crucially, they're not identikit warriors,

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spewed from some workshop assembly line.

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Instead, each figure has a distinct identity.

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This one, he is vigorous, alert, tense, toned,

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the height of manliness with his shoulders back, his teeth bared.

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He is practically growling.

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His companion has a much more droopy quality.

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Look at the sloping shoulders,

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the slightly soft musculature...

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..a much more languid, sinuous pose,

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and just a hint of a depressive expression.

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Inside the contours of this guy, there's something new,

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a quivering sense of psychology -

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hesitant, a touch melancholic perhaps.

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Looking at these two figures,

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it seems self-evident that

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unprecedented accomplishments in bronze casting

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must have been a driving force behind the Greek Revolution,

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or at least an intimate part of it.

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The subtlety, the fluidity and the speed of bronze

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allowed Greek artists to experiment.

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And the forms they created were radically dynamic.

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The Greek Revolution wasn't confined to the sculptor's studio.

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It would become part of daily Greek life...

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..and find expression in a much lowlier, more everyday art form.

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In fact, it may even have started here, with pots.

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Pots, like all of these vases, drinking cups and storage jars,

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they weren't high-status objects in antiquity, unlike sculptures.

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A simply decorated pot might have cost

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the equivalent of two or three days' wages in the 6th century.

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But the funny thing is that the highly competitive artists

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who made and decorated these pots

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may have been in the vanguard of the Greek Revolution,

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blazing a trail for the sculptors who followed.

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Since the 7th century BC,

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there had been a standard way of decorating pots.

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The scene was painted on in clay that, when fired, turned black,

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then details were cut into it with a sharp instrument.

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This was known as black-figure.

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It's a style that's bold, linear, graphic.

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But then, as with bronze, new developments in technique

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offered exciting possibilities.

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Around 530BC,

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one Athenian vase painter decided to try something different,

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to become experimental.

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This is one of his pots.

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On one side, there's a scene in a straightforward black-figure style,

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showing Ajax and Achilles silhouetted in black against a red background

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as they are playing dice.

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But if you turn the pot around...

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..then there's another scene on the other side of it,

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this time a different moment from mythology

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showing Herakles battling a lion.

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But the technique is entirely new.

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The artist here has created the figures using the red,

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and the background has become black.

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We don't know what inspired this artist to try out this new technique.

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It's possible that he just wanted to stand out from his rivals.

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But a bilingual pot, as this is known,

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would have been a way

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of demonstrating that technique for customers.

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And the new technique would liberate vase-painting

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to new levels of sophistication.

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With red-figure vases,

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the details of the image are painted on,

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not scratched on with a metal point.

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Watching one being made, before it's fired,

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you can see how delicate and expressive the artist can be.

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This technique gives her a new, painterly freedom,

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particularly when describing the human figure.

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She's embellished the figures with a fine brush.

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Now she's filling in the background,

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that watered-down clay will turn black when fired in a kiln.

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She adds details.

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This man's curly ringlets...

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or slender curving strokes to suggest the muscles on this warrior's leg.

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Here it is once it's been fired.

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It shows Greek warriors slaughtering the citizens of Troy.

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That's blood on their bodies.

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But look, too, at the way that this sleeve falls on this man's arm,

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it's transparent, almost like gauze.

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And compared to the flat blocks of black-figure painting,

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the effect is much more realistic, almost three dimensional.

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This new freedom of technique

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allowed artists to expand their subjects.

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And it's exactly about this time that artists begin to experiment.

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Not just the old heroic stories from mythology,

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but now scenes of everyday life.

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Even scenes of drunken debauchery, in honour of the wine god Dionysus...

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..a gathering otherwise known as a symposium.

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Now if a symposium to you suggests earnest philosophers debating

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the point of existence, forget it.

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A symposium was a male drinking session.

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Nothing brought out the darker side of the Greek imagination

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like the symposium.

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By day, Apollo guided the Greeks,

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presiding over everything that was orderly and rational.

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But by night, it was the turn of Dionysus and the irrational.

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With booze came the promise of sex.

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And to help get the party going,

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Greek artists developed a racy new art form - the symposium pot.

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Symposium pots were a real gift to artists

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because they offered endless creative possibilities

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for all sorts of ambiguity, role playing, puns, double meaning.

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Mischief essentially.

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But there was a catch - you had to drink to the bottom of the bowl

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to discover what was painted there.

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And, of course, I've now obscured entirely

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the painting that's at the bottom of the pot but I'll give it a go.

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It does encourage quite big gulps, it's a very wide bowl.

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There is am important point here.

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Too often, we look at art in a detached way

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and it's important to remember that ancient artworks,

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objects like these, were made for purpose, they had a function.

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So to really understand them, arguably,

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you have to try and use them, like this.

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Maybe that's part of the point of these works of art.

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They are meant to be a surprise.

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You come into the room, lie down on your couch,

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you're handed one of these bowls, it's full of liquid

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and you get down to the bottom and, by the time you have,

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it's like looking into a mirror, you see a reflection and what

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you're looking at is your Dionysiac self writ large, kind of literally.

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Here the picture is,

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the painting at the bottom,

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a satyr with a large erection,

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a horse's tail to one side,

0:28:370:28:40

and he has amorous desires clearly, he's chasing a woman,

0:28:400:28:45

a maenad I guess, a follower of Dionysus

0:28:450:28:48

because she's wearing a panther skin and not much else.

0:28:480:28:52

She's got this rather large stick...

0:28:520:28:55

looks like a kind of mop, I think it's known as a thyrsus,

0:28:550:28:59

which she's using to tickle the satyr.

0:28:590:29:02

And, although she's resisting, it's still a bit of a come-on.

0:29:030:29:07

Clearly the whole mood evoked by this

0:29:070:29:10

is that there's going to be a happy ending to the evening.

0:29:100:29:15

The Greek Revolution -

0:29:250:29:27

a bold shift of style towards a more lifelike kind of art -

0:29:270:29:31

spanned the full range of human experience.

0:29:310:29:35

From the foibles of sexual desire

0:29:350:29:38

to the highest aspirations of the spirit.

0:29:380:29:41

And they found common ground in the Greek obsession with the human body.

0:29:420:29:47

The Greeks put man at the very centre of the universe.

0:29:510:29:54

You can see it in their visual arts

0:29:540:29:56

where their gods and goddesses resemble splendid men and women.

0:29:560:30:00

In idealising the human body, the Greeks felt

0:30:040:30:07

that they could come close to achieving artistic perfection.

0:30:070:30:11

One sculptor certainly thought so.

0:30:170:30:20

His name was Polykleitos.

0:30:200:30:23

Working in the middle of the 5th century BC,

0:30:230:30:27

he would have a profound effect on Greek art

0:30:270:30:30

and, indeed, on all later Western art.

0:30:300:30:32

You can't have a discussion about the ideal male Greek nude

0:30:360:30:41

without considering this fellow -

0:30:410:30:43

the Doryphoros, or spear-bearer, of Polykleitos.

0:30:430:30:47

He must be one of the most carefully

0:30:510:30:54

and subtly conceived sculptures ever created.

0:30:540:30:58

He looks like a virile youth with a large head.

0:31:030:31:07

But he is more than just a straightforward illusion

0:31:070:31:10

of flesh and blood.

0:31:100:31:12

He is also an essay in order and proportion,

0:31:120:31:17

a meticulously composed scheme,

0:31:170:31:19

a blueprint, if you like, for how the nude youth should look

0:31:190:31:24

in order to be as pleasing as possible for the Greek eye.

0:31:240:31:28

The pose is crucial.

0:31:300:31:33

It's known as contrapposto, a figure at rest,

0:31:330:31:36

with the weight shifted onto one leg,

0:31:360:31:39

so that one hip rises up assertively

0:31:390:31:41

while the other one dips under gravity.

0:31:410:31:45

All of the elements of the body

0:31:450:31:46

are arranged in this complex system of balance and tension.

0:31:460:31:51

The arm above the slack leg is tense,

0:31:520:31:55

while the one above the weight-bearing leg is relaxed,

0:31:550:31:59

creating a sort of compositional X.

0:31:590:32:02

The anatomy is very symmetrical, architectural,

0:32:030:32:08

rigid, even, like a breastplate, rather than true to life.

0:32:080:32:11

The penis is modest and restrained.

0:32:130:32:16

And the gaze is calm and detached,

0:32:160:32:19

as though we've left behind the real world

0:32:190:32:22

and entered some lofty realm of art.

0:32:220:32:25

But the most influential innovation of all was this.

0:32:310:32:35

It's a lifted heel.

0:32:380:32:39

Something that implies spontaneity, in-the-moment relaxation,

0:32:390:32:44

which was absent from, say, the flat-footed Riace bronzes.

0:32:440:32:49

This heel was Polykleitos's masterstroke.

0:32:500:32:54

For some tastes, the Doryphoros is that little bit too contrived,

0:32:580:33:03

just a touch self-conscious,

0:33:030:33:05

but Polykleitos did manage to codify and distil

0:33:050:33:09

a large number of complex elements into a single, elegant composition,

0:33:090:33:15

like a beautiful piece of algebra.

0:33:150:33:17

Polykleitos believed he'd discovered the exact proportions of the body

0:33:240:33:27

that expressed artistic perfection.

0:33:270:33:30

"Perfection," he said,

0:33:330:33:35

"comes about little by little through many numbers."

0:33:350:33:38

He even wrote down his calculations in a treatise

0:33:400:33:43

that unfortunately hasn't survived.

0:33:430:33:45

It's a really significant moment in the history of art -

0:33:480:33:52

an artist reflecting on what he does and then theorising about it.

0:33:520:33:57

It's as if Polykleitos was interested in art,

0:33:570:34:01

the pursuit of perfection, for its own sake.

0:34:010:34:04

Thanks to him, it was now legitimate

0:34:040:34:07

to consider people making images in the ancient world

0:34:070:34:10

not as craftsmen, but as artists.

0:34:100:34:13

Polykleitos became known as the man who defined Classical art,

0:34:170:34:22

an art based on ideals of restraint, proportion and harmony.

0:34:220:34:27

This fascination with the idealised male body was a powerful factor

0:34:290:34:34

in the Greek Revolution.

0:34:340:34:36

It led to a kind of heightened naturalism never seen before.

0:34:370:34:41

The Classical style had arrived

0:34:440:34:47

and would become the bedrock of Western art.

0:34:470:34:50

If Polykleitos was the man who codified the art of Classical Greece,

0:34:590:35:04

then the place where it found its highest expression

0:35:040:35:08

was the city-state of Athens.

0:35:080:35:10

In the 5th century BC,

0:35:120:35:14

Athens dominated Greek art and philosophy, drama and politics.

0:35:140:35:19

The Athenians pioneered a new and unique system of government -

0:35:210:35:25

democracy.

0:35:250:35:27

They were extremely, even fanatically, proud of it,

0:35:270:35:30

though the only people allowed to vote were free men.

0:35:300:35:34

They were even prouder of their military power.

0:35:350:35:38

They had just driven out their mortal enemies, the Persians.

0:35:380:35:43

In 480BC, the Persians had trashed the sacred heart of the city -

0:35:430:35:49

the Acropolis.

0:35:490:35:51

The site lay untouched for years, an Athenian Ground Zero.

0:35:510:35:56

And when they rebuilt it, it was with reborn ambition.

0:35:560:36:00

Everything about the extensive building project

0:36:190:36:22

on the Acropolis was grandiose.

0:36:220:36:24

It was a showpiece, really,

0:36:240:36:26

that expressed the wealth and power of the Athenian empire.

0:36:260:36:30

Elaborate artworks adorned the temple-cum-treasury of the Parthenon.

0:36:310:36:36

At either end, in the pediments,

0:36:360:36:38

there were grand sculptures portraying the gods.

0:36:380:36:41

And, wrapped around the exterior of the building,

0:36:410:36:44

there were dramatic sculpted panels showing mythological scenes.

0:36:440:36:48

Even in antiquity, the Parthenon was recognised

0:36:550:36:58

as perhaps the most perfect Greek temple ever built, bringing together

0:36:580:37:02

all the Classical ideals of order, symmetry and geometrical proportion.

0:37:020:37:07

But running around the building's inner block was something new -

0:37:140:37:17

an elaborate frieze that was 160 metres long.

0:37:170:37:21

Some of the Parthenon's sculptures are just breathtaking.

0:37:270:37:31

Was there ever a horse's head with as much nervous energy as this one?

0:37:330:37:37

Look at this goddess, probably Aphrodite,

0:37:390:37:42

her clothes cling to her in sensuous folds that beguile the eye.

0:37:420:37:47

But there's a mystery to much of what is here.

0:37:530:37:55

The really surprising thing about the Parthenon sculptures

0:38:010:38:05

is that no-one knows what they represent.

0:38:050:38:08

There are lots of theories, some more outlandish than others.

0:38:090:38:14

But this is arguably the most famous work of Ancient Greek art

0:38:140:38:20

and it still leaves us perplexed.

0:38:200:38:22

Take the frieze.

0:38:240:38:26

We can see that it dramatises a great procession,

0:38:260:38:31

mingling citizens and also gods,

0:38:310:38:34

yet its precise significance is still elusive.

0:38:340:38:37

But in a broad sense,

0:38:420:38:44

the overriding message of the frieze is pretty clear.

0:38:440:38:48

The giveaway is the manner in which the figures have been sculpted.

0:38:480:38:53

Look at the faces of these skilled horsemen

0:38:530:38:55

who once thundered along the northern side of the temple.

0:38:550:38:59

They are all so similar -

0:38:590:39:01

strangely blank, uniformly beautiful, and idealised.

0:39:010:39:06

They're certainly not portraits of individuals.

0:39:070:39:12

But, cumulatively, they offer a vision of a well-drilled community

0:39:120:39:16

with a really powerful sense of its own identity.

0:39:160:39:20

So this is art as a glorious statement of political togetherness.

0:39:230:39:29

The Classical style has become the servant of Athenian self-confidence.

0:39:290:39:35

In this sense, a social revolution had stimulated an artistic one.

0:39:400:39:45

These identikit citizens seem to be riding towards a glorious future.

0:39:490:39:54

Democratic Athens lavished money

0:40:110:40:14

on huge public projects like the Parthenon.

0:40:140:40:17

But there's another side to Greek art, less well known, perhaps,

0:40:180:40:23

but, to me, equally beautiful.

0:40:230:40:25

One that has nothing to do

0:40:250:40:27

with the triumphalist carvings up there on the Acropolis.

0:40:270:40:30

This is the site of the Kerameikos cemetery.

0:40:330:40:37

It's where 5th-century Athenians buried their dead.

0:40:370:40:41

And when democratic Athens was at its self-promoting height,

0:40:410:40:45

it banned grave monuments that were considered too ostentatious,

0:40:450:40:49

so no big statues, no great sarcophagi.

0:40:490:40:53

Ordinary people were now buried here, not just the elite,

0:40:540:40:57

and space was confined.

0:40:570:41:00

Some Athenians developed a much more modest, more intimate way

0:41:000:41:03

of remembering their loved ones.

0:41:030:41:05

One artist in particular pioneered

0:41:170:41:19

a new, restrained and melancholy sort of art.

0:41:190:41:23

If you think all Greek pots look the same, then look again

0:41:340:41:38

because works of art like this

0:41:380:41:41

with their exquisite draughtsmanship

0:41:410:41:43

and colour against a white background

0:41:430:41:46

are unusual.

0:41:460:41:47

One of the masters of the genre was the man who painted this

0:41:480:41:52

and he specialised in simple, serene scenes.

0:41:520:41:56

Intimate, domestic moments like this one

0:41:560:41:59

where we see a wife and her husband taking his leave.

0:41:590:42:02

Look at the subtle use of colour to evoke that delicacy,

0:42:030:42:07

the transparency of the top worn by the woman.

0:42:070:42:12

And that woman, she's beautiful.

0:42:120:42:15

She's almost imperious, empowered,

0:42:150:42:19

because her expression looks yearning, perhaps even reproachful,

0:42:190:42:25

but she emits poise with that relaxed arm slung over the back of her chair.

0:42:250:42:30

There's no question this woman is the equal of her partner.

0:42:340:42:38

And as he holds out his helmet, just look down at the bottom

0:42:380:42:42

where, sweetly, they are playing this game of footsie.

0:42:420:42:47

Crucially, her foot is on top of his.

0:42:470:42:50

What a telling, powerful, psychological detail.

0:42:520:42:55

It's so sad. She doesn't want to let him go.

0:42:550:42:58

It's a really tender note,

0:43:000:43:02

everything that the big, public monuments

0:43:020:43:04

of Classical Athens were not,

0:43:040:43:06

as this couple prepare for departure, for war, and beyond.

0:43:060:43:11

For centuries, art historians argued that the Greek Revolution

0:43:220:43:26

grew directly out of the triumph of Athenian democracy.

0:43:260:43:30

But surely it's much more complex than that.

0:43:320:43:36

The truth is it was more a question of everything coming together

0:43:360:43:40

at the same extraordinary moment.

0:43:400:43:43

Political power of course but, also, new techniques in making art,

0:43:430:43:48

a novel, sensuous awareness of the human body,

0:43:480:43:52

terrific competitiveness between artists and craftsmen,

0:43:520:43:56

and an exhilarating sense of unique Greek identity.

0:43:560:44:01

The great age of Athens would last for a century and a half.

0:44:050:44:09

But Greek city-states were frequently at war.

0:44:110:44:14

Athenian might would eventually fall to a hostile power.

0:44:160:44:20

From Greece's mountainous northern region known as Macedonia

0:44:360:44:40

came a dynasty of warrior kings.

0:44:400:44:43

By the middle of the 4th century BC,

0:44:430:44:45

Athens and most of Greece had been brought under their sway.

0:44:450:44:49

Here in 1977, archaeologists made an extraordinary discovery.

0:44:530:44:59

Deep in a hillside near the small town of Vergina,

0:45:010:45:05

they unearthed the royal burial site of Macedon,

0:45:050:45:08

including the tomb of Philip II, father of Alexander the Great.

0:45:080:45:14

The tomb, and what was found inside it, told a powerful story

0:45:180:45:22

about a new ideology of royal power.

0:45:220:45:25

Dominating the facade of Philip's tomb is this extraordinary survival -

0:45:400:45:46

a rare original painting from Ancient Greece.

0:45:460:45:49

Of course, now, it's withered over time,

0:45:490:45:53

but you still get a strong sense of its subtlety and complexity.

0:45:530:45:59

We see a group of young men, some of them on horseback,

0:45:590:46:03

out hunting wild beasts in a forested landscape.

0:46:030:46:06

The first time, as far as we know,

0:46:060:46:09

that landscape appeared with such prominence in Greek art,

0:46:090:46:12

almost as a subject in its own right.

0:46:120:46:15

The landscape gives us a sense of depth.

0:46:160:46:19

These are figures occupying a believable space,

0:46:190:46:22

the effect being enhanced by clever details

0:46:220:46:25

like the horse rearing up on its hind legs

0:46:250:46:28

and its neck veers off towards the distance,

0:46:280:46:31

momentarily drawing us that way.

0:46:310:46:33

The shafts of the men's spears, they structure the composition as well,

0:46:350:46:39

pointing us towards the quarry of the men, what they're hunting -

0:46:390:46:44

a lion, a deer, a boar and a bear.

0:46:440:46:47

This is a painting that's glamorous and elegant,

0:46:490:46:52

recording a favourite pastime of the Macedonian elite

0:46:520:46:56

and it might even feature Alexander himself -

0:46:560:46:59

the youth on horseback in the middle, wearing a wreath,

0:46:590:47:02

charging in for the kill.

0:47:020:47:04

But the striking thing about this is that you can still see

0:47:060:47:10

the skill with which it's been constructed.

0:47:100:47:13

The tree trunks act like punctuation marks,

0:47:130:47:16

giving the whole thing poise and structure

0:47:160:47:19

so that there is a sense of the frenzy, the excitement of the hunt,

0:47:190:47:23

but we're never lost amid the fog of the action.

0:47:230:47:26

Today, the condition of the painting

0:47:290:47:31

has a distinctly foggy quality itself.

0:47:310:47:34

Above all, it's rather sad.

0:47:350:47:38

A tantalising work of art,

0:47:380:47:40

a glimpse of the many riches of Greek painting which have been lost.

0:47:400:47:45

Inside the complex of royal tombs

0:47:510:47:54

excavators found a series of dazzling treasures.

0:47:540:47:57

In an antechamber, they discovered this gold casket

0:47:590:48:03

containing the remains of a woman, Philip's queen.

0:48:030:48:07

Nearby lay the gold crown of Philip himself,

0:48:090:48:12

made to resemble an oak wreath, with a dramatic mesh of leaves and acorns.

0:48:120:48:18

It looks light as gossamer, but weighs more than a kilogram.

0:48:200:48:24

But the treasure that thrills me most is this.

0:48:270:48:31

This diadem that's just so delicate.

0:48:440:48:48

This carefully composed flurry of tendrils and spirals,

0:48:480:48:53

leaves and petals and flowers.

0:48:530:48:55

The workmanship is detailed, but it's just exquisitely done.

0:49:000:49:04

The whole thing feels like it's been spun out of light.

0:49:070:49:10

This is a new kind of Greek art,

0:49:210:49:24

different from anything we have seen.

0:49:240:49:26

It isn't the religious art of the temple,

0:49:260:49:29

or the humanist art that celebrated the naked body.

0:49:290:49:32

But art that glorifies an all-conquering hero.

0:49:340:49:38

This set of ivory figures was found inside Philip's tomb.

0:49:450:49:49

Just look at that face - he's wily, wrinkled, supremely self-assured,

0:49:570:50:03

a nugget of concentrated charisma.

0:50:030:50:06

It is probably a portrait of Philip himself.

0:50:080:50:11

And if it is, it represents a sea change in Greek art

0:50:130:50:17

because the restrained, almost blank facial expressions

0:50:170:50:21

of earlier Classical art have disappeared,

0:50:210:50:24

replaced with something approaching an actual likeness.

0:50:240:50:28

The triumph of the individual

0:50:280:50:30

over the old communal identity of the city-state.

0:50:300:50:33

That sense of individualism touched the artists themselves.

0:50:440:50:49

With self-glorifying rulers came a new generation of celebrity artists,

0:50:490:50:54

men who cultivated their image, broke the rules

0:50:540:50:57

and occasionally liked to shock.

0:50:570:50:59

The most celebrated artist of all was called Praxiteles.

0:51:040:51:08

And, amazingly, he was listed among the 300 richest men in Athens.

0:51:080:51:12

He didn't make art to order, pandering to clients.

0:51:120:51:16

Instead, people came to him

0:51:160:51:18

and clamoured to buy whatever he decided to make.

0:51:180:51:20

Praxiteles relished scandal.

0:51:290:51:31

His girlfriend was a famous courtesan.

0:51:310:51:34

And there's an irreverent wit to everything he does.

0:51:340:51:38

His sculpture took the Classical style in a direction all his own.

0:51:470:51:51

No-one would exploit the sensual appeal of marble like Praxiteles.

0:51:590:52:03

Praxiteles's vision of male beauty wasn't macho

0:52:240:52:28

but softer, more androgynous.

0:52:280:52:31

Rather than magnificent athletes, he wanted to portray the gods

0:52:330:52:37

and in a way that had never been seen before.

0:52:370:52:40

He certainly didn't inject much shock and awe

0:52:400:52:44

into his depictions of divinity.

0:52:440:52:47

Here, we see Apollo, almost boyish,

0:52:470:52:51

an indolent adolescent,

0:52:510:52:54

idling away his time

0:52:540:52:55

by languidly threatening a passing lizard with an arrow.

0:52:550:52:59

If the gods were the film stars of the ancient world,

0:53:010:53:06

this is a young heart-throb caught off duty in a moment of informality.

0:53:060:53:13

And there's real boldness in that new spirit of irreverence

0:53:140:53:19

because we're left with something very charming, teasing,

0:53:190:53:23

even ironic

0:53:230:53:25

and, in the 4th century BC,

0:53:250:53:27

that must have felt very sophisticated and modern.

0:53:270:53:30

It was here, among the scattered ruins of Olympia,

0:53:400:53:44

that another statue believed to be by Praxiteles

0:53:440:53:47

was excavated in the 19th century.

0:53:470:53:49

Like the Apollo with the lizard,

0:53:510:53:53

it shows a Greek god engaged in an ordinary, rather mundane activity.

0:53:530:53:59

Hermes playing with the infant Dionysus.

0:54:010:54:04

In his missing right hand,

0:54:070:54:09

Hermes probably once dangled a bunch of grapes.

0:54:090:54:13

After all, Dionysus would grow up to be the god of wine.

0:54:130:54:17

It's a lovely, witty and ironical conceit

0:54:260:54:29

in which innocence is perversely being tempted

0:54:290:54:34

by the pleasures of experience.

0:54:340:54:36

What's so appealing about Praxiteles

0:54:360:54:39

is that he was such a deft and nimble artist.

0:54:390:54:43

He enjoyed teasing, toying with conventions

0:54:430:54:46

in order to foreground his own light-footed genius,

0:54:460:54:50

rather than just shackling it in simple service to Greek religion.

0:54:500:54:55

This is as much about the artist as it is about the gods.

0:54:550:55:00

This gleaming sculpture

0:55:040:55:06

gets to the heart of what Praxiteles was all about.

0:55:060:55:09

Gone are the awe-inspiring, rugged Olympian gods

0:55:200:55:24

imagined by earlier Classical artists.

0:55:240:55:27

In their place is a new vision,

0:55:270:55:29

something sleeker, more sinuous and graceful, even effeminate,

0:55:290:55:35

something that champions the smooth polish of shining Parian marble

0:55:350:55:40

over the effects of bronze,

0:55:400:55:42

though without losing some of the subtlety

0:55:420:55:44

that bronze had added to Greek art.

0:55:440:55:47

There is a softness here,

0:55:470:55:49

a blurriness to the transitions of the muscles across Hermes's torso,

0:55:490:55:53

as well as his face.

0:55:530:55:55

And that old Polykleitan idea of the contrapposto pose,

0:55:550:56:00

here it's been distorted, exaggerated to an off-balance extreme,

0:56:000:56:06

because Hermes is thrusting out one hip in this exaggerated,

0:56:060:56:11

almost camp fashion.

0:56:110:56:13

We've come a long, long way from the virile ideal of the Riace bronzes.

0:56:150:56:20

Is it ever possible to explain

0:56:270:56:29

exactly why a culture suddenly becomes capable of such excellence?

0:56:290:56:35

It's been called the Greek Miracle.

0:56:350:56:38

Perhaps it was just a perfect storm

0:56:390:56:42

of ambitious artists and demanding clients...

0:56:420:56:45

..of technical innovation

0:56:480:56:50

and fast-growing skills...

0:56:500:56:53

..of dynamic social change...

0:56:550:56:57

..and the freedom to experiment.

0:56:580:57:01

To us, the artistic achievement of Classical Greece

0:57:040:57:08

seems almost overwhelming.

0:57:080:57:10

And yet the strange thing is,

0:57:110:57:13

the Greeks didn't necessarily think

0:57:130:57:15

that art would be their greatest legacy.

0:57:150:57:18

The Athenian leader Pericles supposedly said

0:57:210:57:25

that Athens would be remembered for ruling more Greeks

0:57:250:57:28

than any other Greek state.

0:57:280:57:31

He was wrong.

0:57:310:57:33

As well as its empire,

0:57:330:57:34

it was the art of Athens and the wider world of Ancient Greece

0:57:340:57:38

that secured its immortality.

0:57:380:57:41

The irony is that Greek artists were just so good, so successful

0:57:410:57:46

and achieved so many breakthroughs, that their revolutionary creations

0:57:460:57:50

became the benchmark not only for the Greeks,

0:57:500:57:54

but also for the entire tradition of Western art.

0:57:540:57:57

Next time.

0:58:000:58:01

The astonishing afterlife of Greek art.

0:58:010:58:05

How, for 2,000 years,

0:58:050:58:07

a handful of masterpieces held the world in thrall.

0:58:070:58:11

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