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David (Bernini)
''David'' is a life-size marble sculpture by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. The sculpture was one of many commissions to decorate the villa of Bernini's patron Cardinal Scipione Borghese – where it still resides today, as part of the Galleria Borghese. It was completed in the course of eight months from 1623 to 1624. The subject of the work is the biblical David, about to throw the stone that will bring down Goliath, which will allow David to behead him. Compared to earlier works on the same theme (notably the ''David'' of Michelangelo), the sculpture broke new ground in its implied movement and its psychological intensity. Background Between 1618 and 1625 Bernini was commissioned to undertake various sculptural work for the villa of one of his patrons, Cardinal Scipione Borghese. In 1623 – only yet 24 years old – he was working on the sculpture of '' Apollo and Daphne'', when, for unknown reasons, he abandoned this project to start work on the ''David''. According to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Gian Lorenzo (or Gianlorenzo) Bernini (, ; ; Italian Giovanni Lorenzo; 7 December 1598 – 28 November 1680) was an Italians, Italian sculptor and Italian architect, architect. While a major figure in the world of architecture, he was more prominently the leading sculptor of his age, credited with creating the Baroque sculpture, Baroque style of sculpture. As one scholar has commented, "What Shakespeare is to drama, Bernini may be to sculpture: the first pan-European sculptor whose name is instantaneously identifiable with a particular manner and vision, and whose influence was inordinately powerful ..." In addition, he was a painter (mostly small canvases in oil) and a man of the theatre: he wrote, directed and acted in plays (mostly Carnival satires), for which he designed stage sets and theatrical machinery. He produced designs as well for a wide variety of decorative art objects including lamps, tables, mirrors, and even coaches. As an architect and city planner, he de ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sling (weapon)
A sling is a projectile weapon typically used to hand-throw a blunt projectile such as a stone, clay, or lead " sling-bullet". It is also known as the shepherd's sling or slingshot (in British English, although elsewhere it means something else). Someone who specializes in using slings is called a slinger. A sling has a small cradle or ''pouch'' in the middle of two retention cords, where a projectile is placed. There is a loop on the end of one side of the retention cords. Depending on the design of the sling, either the middle finger or the wrist is placed through a loop on the end of one cord, and a tab at the end of the other cord is placed between the thumb and forefinger. The sling is swung in an arc, and the tab released at a precise moment. This action releases the projectile to fly inertially and ballistically towards the target. By its double-pendulum kinetics, the sling enables stones (or spears) to be thrown much further than they could be by hand alone. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Polyphemus
Polyphemus (; , ; ) is the one-eyed giant son of Poseidon and Thoosa in Greek mythology, one of the Cyclopes described in Homer's ''Odyssey''. His name means "abounding in songs and legends", "many-voiced" or "very famous". Polyphemus first appeared as a savage man-eating giant in the ninth book of the ''Odyssey''. The satyr play of Euripides is dependent on this episode apart from one detail; Polyphemus is made a pederast in the play. Later Classical writers presented him in their poems as heterosexual and linked his name with the nymph Galatea. Often he was portrayed as unsuccessful in these, and as unaware of his disproportionate size and musical failings. In the work of even later authors, however, he is presented as both a successful lover and skilled musician. From the Renaissance on, art and literature reflect all of these interpretations of the giant. Odysseus and Polyphemus Ancient sources In Homer's epic, Odysseus lands on the island of the Cyclopes during his jou ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cyclops
In Greek mythology and later Roman mythology, the Cyclopes ( ; , ''Kýklōpes'', "Circle-eyes" or "Round-eyes"; singular Cyclops ; , ''Kýklōps'') are giant one-eyed creatures. Three groups of Cyclopes can be distinguished. In Hesiod's ''Theogony'', the Cyclopes are the three brothers, Brontes, Steropes, and Arges, who made Zeus's weapon, the thunderbolt. In Homer's ''Odyssey'', they are an uncivilized group of shepherds, the brethren of Polyphemus encountered by Odysseus. Cyclopes were also famous for being the builders of the Cyclopean walls of Mycenae and Tiryns. In '' Cyclops'', the fifth-century BC play by Euripides, a chorus of satyrs offers comic relief based on the encounter of Odysseus and Polyphemus. The third-century BC poet Callimachus makes the Hesiodic Cyclopes the assistants of smith-god Hephaestus, as does Virgil in the Latin epic ''Aeneid'', where he seems to equate the Hesiodic and Homeric Cyclopes. From at least the fifth century BC, Cyclopes have be ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Fresco
Fresco ( or frescoes) is a technique of mural painting executed upon freshly laid ("wet") lime plaster. Water is used as the vehicle for the dry-powder pigment to merge with the plaster, and with the setting of the plaster, the painting becomes an integral part of the wall. The word ''fresco'' () is derived from the Italian adjective ''fresco'' meaning "fresh", and may thus be contrasted with fresco-secco or secco mural painting techniques, which are applied to dried plaster, to supplement painting in fresco. The fresco technique has been employed since antiquity and is closely associated with Italian Renaissance painting. The word ''fresco'' is commonly and inaccurately used in English to refer to any wall painting regardless of the plaster technology or binding medium. This, in part, contributes to a misconception that the most geographically and temporally common wall painting technology was the painting into wet lime plaster. Even in apparently '' buon fresco'' technology ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Annibale Carracci
Annibale Carracci ( , , ; November 3, 1560 – July 15, 1609) was an Italian painter and instructor, active in Bologna and later in Rome. Along with his brother Agostino Carracci, Agostino and cousin Ludovico Carracci, Ludovico (with whom the Carracci, he also worked collectively), Annibale was one of the progenitors, if not founders of a leading strand of the Baroque art, Baroque style, borrowing from styles from both north and south of their native city, and aspiring for a return to classical monumentality, but adding a more vital dynamism. Painters working under Annibale at the gallery of the Palazzo Farnese would be highly influential in Roman painting for decades. Early career Annibale Carracci was born in Bologna, and in all likelihood was first apprenticed within his family. In 1582, Annibale, his brother Agostino Carracci, Agostino and his cousin Ludovico Carracci opened a painters' studio, initially called by some the ''Academy of the Desiderosi'' (desirous of fame an ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Borghese Gladiator
The ''Borghese Gladiator'' is a Hellenistic life-size marble sculpture portraying a swordsman, created at Ephesus about 100 BC, now on display at the Louvre. Sculptor The sculpture is signed on the pedestal by Agasias, son of Dositheus, who is otherwise unknown. It is not quite clear whether the Agasias who is mentioned as the father of Heraclides is the same person. Agasias, son of Menophilus may have been a cousin. Rediscovery It was found before 1611, in the present territory of Anzio south of Rome, among the ruins of a seaside palace of Nero on the site of the ancient Antium. From the attitude of the figure it is clear that the statue represents not a gladiator, but a warrior contending with a mounted combatant. In the days when antique sculptures gained immediacy by being identified with specific figures from history or literature, Friedrich Thiersch conjectured that it was intended to represent Achilles fighting with the mounted Amazon, Penthesilea. The sculpture was ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Winged Victory Of Samothrace
The ''Winged Victory of Samothrace'', or the ''Niké of Samothrace'', is a Votive offering, votive monument originally discovered on the island of Samothrace in the northeastern Aegean Sea. It is a masterpiece of Greek sculpture from the Hellenistic art, Hellenistic era, dating from the beginning of the 2nd century BC (190 BC). It is composed of a statue representing the goddess Nike (mythology), Niké (Victory), whose head and arms are missing and its base is in the shape of a ship's bow. The total height of the monument is including the Socle (architecture), socle; the statue alone measures . The sculpture is one of a small number of major Hellenistic sculpture, Hellenistic statues surviving in the original, rather than Roman sculpture, Roman copies. ''Winged Victory'' has been exhibited at the Louvre in Paris, at the top of the main staircase, since 1884. Greece is seeking the Repatriation (cultural property), return of the sculpture. Discovery and restorations In the 19t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hellenistic Art
Hellenistic art is the art of the Hellenistic period generally taken to begin with the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and end with the Roman Greece, conquest of the Greek world by the Romans, a process well underway by 146 BC, when the Greek mainland was taken, and essentially ending in 30 BC with the conquest of Ptolemaic Kingdom, Ptolemaic Egypt following the Battle of Actium. A number of the best-known works of Greek sculpture belong to this period, including ''Laocoön and His Sons'', ''Dying Gaul'', ''Venus de Milo'', and the ''Winged Victory of Samothrace''. It follows the period of Ancient Greek art, Classical Greek art, while the succeeding Roman art, Greco-Roman art was very largely a continuation of Hellenistic trends. The term ''Hellenistic'' refers to the expansion of Greek influence and dissemination of its ideas following the death of Alexander – the "Hellenizing" of the world, with Koine Greek as a common language. The term is a modern invention; the Hell ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Michelangelo
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (6March 147518February 1564), known mononymously as Michelangelo, was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet of the High Renaissance. Born in the Republic of Florence, his work was inspired by models from classical antiquity and had a lasting influence on Western art. Michelangelo's creative abilities and mastery in a range of artistic arenas define him as an archetypal Renaissance man, along with his rival and elder contemporary, Leonardo da Vinci. Given the sheer volume of surviving correspondence, sketches, and reminiscences, Michelangelo is one of the best-documented artists of the 16th century. He was lauded by contemporary biographers as the most accomplished artist of his era. Michelangelo achieved fame early. Two of his best-known works, the ''Pietà (Michelangelo), Pietà'' and ''David (Michelangelo), David'', were sculpted before the age of 30. Although he did not consider himself a painter, Michelangelo created ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andrea Del Verrocchio
Andrea del Verrocchio ( , , ; born Andrea di Michele di Francesco de' Cioni; – 1488) was an Italian sculpture, sculptor, List of Italian painters, painter and goldsmith who was a master of an important workshop in Florence. He apparently became known as ''Verrocchio'' after the surname of his master, a goldsmith. Few paintings are attributed to him with certainty, but important painters were trained at his workshop. His pupils included Leonardo da Vinci, Pietro Perugino and Lorenzo di Credi. His greatest importance was as a sculptor and his last work, the Equestrian statue of Bartolomeo Colleoni in Venice, is generally accepted as his masterpiece. Life Verrocchio was born in Florence in around 1435. His father, Michele di Francesco Cioni, initially worked as a tile and brick maker, then later as a tax collector. Verrocchio never married, and had to provide financial support for some members of his family. He was at first apprenticed to a goldsmith. It has been suggested that ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Donatello
Donato di Niccolò di Betto Bardi ( – 13 December 1466), known mononymously as Donatello (; ), was an Italian Renaissance sculpture, Italian sculptor of the Renaissance period. Born in Republic of Florence, Florence, he studied classical sculpture and used his knowledge to develop an Early Renaissance style of sculpture. He spent time in other cities, where he worked on commissions and taught others; his periods in Rome, Padua, and Siena introduced to other parts of Italy the techniques he had developed in the course of a long and productive career. His ''David (Donatello, bronze), David'' was the first freestanding Nude (art), nude male sculpture since antiquity; like much of his work it was commissioned by the Medici family. He worked with stone, bronze, wood, clay, stucco, and wax, and used glass in inventive ways. He had several assistants, with four perhaps being a typical number. Although his best-known works are mostly statues executed in the round, he developed a ne ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
