Helle Hochscheid
Helle Hochscheid lectures in archaeology, ancient history and ancient literature at University College Roosevelt (Utrecht University) in the Netherlands. Her main interest is in ancient Greek sculpture, with focal points in gender-related and other social aspects (patronage, status of sculptors and patrons), body image and medicinal views reflected in sculpture, and the concept of embodied cognition in relation to sculpture. She is the author of Networks of Stone (Oxford: Peter Lang, 2015) and co-founder of the Ancient Sculpture Association.
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In this paper, the elitist image of sculpture production and its social context, in the particular case of sixth and fifth-century Athens, is contested by applying two theoretical frameworks to a variety of sources. The first is the theory of horizontal and vertical specialisation in ancient economies (e.g. Greene 2000). Contrary to common perception, sculptural practice in archaic and classical Athens had relatively high levels of vertical specialisation, in which specialist craftsmen other than sculptors contributed considerably to final products. This claim is supported by archaeological evidence from original statues, excavations, and an analysis of sculpture terminology in ancient texts.
Second is the concept of Art Worlds, which entails that works of art are ‘…joint products of all the people who cooperate via an art world’s conventions to bring works like that into existence’ (Becker 1984, 34-5). Thus, not only sculptors but other groups must be taken into account when looking at the production of ancient sculpture, including various kinds of craftsmen, patrons, and even audiences. From this point of view, comments on sculpture by (near-)contemporaries such as Plato take on a new meaning, since they too are part of the art world of sculpture.
In conclusion, a contextual approach to the archaic and classical sculpture from Athens allows us to shed some of the bias which classical archaeology has developed over the centuries, and to look at these famous works of art in a new light. The combination of an inclusive approach to sculpture production and a wide variety of sources enables a more practical and realistic view of what it meant to make sculpture in and for Athenians society in the sixth and fifth centuries BC.
In this study, asymmetries (as one possible method of achieving optical correction) in the heads of extant fifth-century Greek sculpture have been analysed in relation to the ideal view and the pose of statues. All heads that were measured were asymmetrical, but statistical analysis showed no systematic pattern in the data that could be considered representative for sculpture from Classical Greece in general.
The lack of a statistically significant pattern means that (subconscious) correction of visual perception is not at the root of the asymmetries, undermining the notion of systematic application of contemporary optical theory by sculptors or the influence of their own visual perception. However, a practical explanation for the unsystematic asymmetries presented itself through interviews with seven sculptors, who pointed out technical reasons why asymmetries would occur naturally during carving, without influence of theoretical designs or visual perception.
http://www.artofmaking.ac.uk/content/essays/conference-chapter-shaping-space-facial-asymmetries-in-fifth-century-greek-sculpture-helle-hochscheid-and-ronald-hamel/
This volume presents new scholarship on the value and valuing of craft production in ancient societies around the Mediterranean. Ancient economic history, especially when approached archaeologically, has typically — and with good reason — focused upon the objects that were produced by craftspeople, their form and style, and their distribution. Typological approaches necessary for sorting and analysing large bodies of material evidence have also prioritized the final form of artefacts. Yet it was first and foremost the craftspeople behind these items who were responsible for an item’s functionality, its purpose, and its value, and these roles have in recent years received fresh attention in anthropological and sociological studies.
The contributions gathered in this volume revolve around the role of makers, their handling of materials, and their place in networks of production and consumption, whilst at the same time remembering that craftspeople were never lone forces but depended on wider networks of supplies, colleagues, and consumers, as well as more ephemeral considerations such as aesthetics and religious value. Through this approach, the volume sheds new light not only on a range of crafts and materials from the ancient world, but also on the value of making and the making of value in ancient Mediterranean societies.
Networks of Stone explores the social and creative processes of sculpture production in Athens in the sixth and fifth centuries bc. Using the concept of art worlds, it analyses the contributions and interactions of all those who were in some way part of creating the sculpture set up in the sanctuaries and cemeteries of Athens. The choices that were made not only by patrons and sculptors, but also by traders in various materials and a range of craftsmen all influenced the final appearance of these works of art. By looking beyond the sculptor to the network of craftsmen and patrons that constituted the art world, this study offers new insights into well-known archaeological evidence and some of the highlights of classical art history.
The databases of Networks of Stone consist of five tables containing related datasets, divided over three files. One of these, the Bases table, presents bases and other supports of votive and sepulchral sculpture from Athens in the sixth and fifth centuries BC. Of the others, two contain votive sculptures and the corresponding references, and gravestones and their references. Each table is available on this site in a report in .pdf format: votives and the votives references are combined in one file, and so are gravestones and the corresponding references. A readme if provided at the beginning of each pdf for abbreviations and reading instructions. For the original Access database format, please contact the author stating your purpose with the database, your affiliation and how the database will be referenced.
Please download as needed from the attachments on this site. For all academic or creative use of the database, please acknowledge authorship and apply full citations.
The phenomenon of optical correction in classical Greek sculpture has been attested to by ancient authors such as Plato, as well as modern scholars. The apparent normalcy of optical correction in sculpture is, however, not self-evident. How such correction worked, whether it was based in philosophical or optical theories, and how widely spread it was among sculptors, are questions which are rarely examined systematically.
In this study, asymmetries (as one possible method of achieving optical correction) in the heads of extant fifth-century sculpture have been analysed in relation to the ideal view and the pose of the statues. All heads which were measured were asymmetrical, but statistical analysis showed that there is no systematic pattern in this dataset which could be considered representative for sculpture from classical Greece in general.
Yet this lack of statistical significance does not mean that asymmetries do not require explanation. Seven interviewed sculptors pointed out practical and technical reasons why asymmetries would occur naturally during carving, in modern as in ancient sculpture, without conscious or theoretical designs behind them."""
In this paper, the elitist image of sculpture production and its social context, in the particular case of sixth and fifth-century Athens, is contested by applying two theoretical frameworks to a variety of sources. The first is the theory of horizontal and vertical specialisation in ancient economies (e.g. Greene 2000). Contrary to common perception, sculptural practice in archaic and classical Athens had relatively high levels of vertical specialisation, in which specialist craftsmen other than sculptors contributed considerably to final products. This claim is supported by archaeological evidence from original statues, excavations, and an analysis of sculpture terminology in ancient texts.
Second is the concept of Art Worlds, which entails that works of art are ‘…joint products of all the people who cooperate via an art world’s conventions to bring works like that into existence’ (Becker 1984, 34-5). Thus, not only sculptors but other groups must be taken into account when looking at the production of ancient sculpture, including various kinds of craftsmen, patrons, and even audiences. From this point of view, comments on sculpture by (near-)contemporaries such as Plato take on a new meaning, since they too are part of the art world of sculpture.
In conclusion, a contextual approach to the archaic and classical sculpture from Athens allows us to shed some of the bias which classical archaeology has developed over the centuries, and to look at these famous works of art in a new light. The combination of an inclusive approach to sculpture production and a wide variety of sources enables a more practical and realistic view of what it meant to make sculpture in and for Athenians society in the sixth and fifth centuries BC.
In this study, asymmetries (as one possible method of achieving optical correction) in the heads of extant fifth-century Greek sculpture have been analysed in relation to the ideal view and the pose of statues. All heads that were measured were asymmetrical, but statistical analysis showed no systematic pattern in the data that could be considered representative for sculpture from Classical Greece in general.
The lack of a statistically significant pattern means that (subconscious) correction of visual perception is not at the root of the asymmetries, undermining the notion of systematic application of contemporary optical theory by sculptors or the influence of their own visual perception. However, a practical explanation for the unsystematic asymmetries presented itself through interviews with seven sculptors, who pointed out technical reasons why asymmetries would occur naturally during carving, without influence of theoretical designs or visual perception.
http://www.artofmaking.ac.uk/content/essays/conference-chapter-shaping-space-facial-asymmetries-in-fifth-century-greek-sculpture-helle-hochscheid-and-ronald-hamel/
This volume presents new scholarship on the value and valuing of craft production in ancient societies around the Mediterranean. Ancient economic history, especially when approached archaeologically, has typically — and with good reason — focused upon the objects that were produced by craftspeople, their form and style, and their distribution. Typological approaches necessary for sorting and analysing large bodies of material evidence have also prioritized the final form of artefacts. Yet it was first and foremost the craftspeople behind these items who were responsible for an item’s functionality, its purpose, and its value, and these roles have in recent years received fresh attention in anthropological and sociological studies.
The contributions gathered in this volume revolve around the role of makers, their handling of materials, and their place in networks of production and consumption, whilst at the same time remembering that craftspeople were never lone forces but depended on wider networks of supplies, colleagues, and consumers, as well as more ephemeral considerations such as aesthetics and religious value. Through this approach, the volume sheds new light not only on a range of crafts and materials from the ancient world, but also on the value of making and the making of value in ancient Mediterranean societies.
Networks of Stone explores the social and creative processes of sculpture production in Athens in the sixth and fifth centuries bc. Using the concept of art worlds, it analyses the contributions and interactions of all those who were in some way part of creating the sculpture set up in the sanctuaries and cemeteries of Athens. The choices that were made not only by patrons and sculptors, but also by traders in various materials and a range of craftsmen all influenced the final appearance of these works of art. By looking beyond the sculptor to the network of craftsmen and patrons that constituted the art world, this study offers new insights into well-known archaeological evidence and some of the highlights of classical art history.
The databases of Networks of Stone consist of five tables containing related datasets, divided over three files. One of these, the Bases table, presents bases and other supports of votive and sepulchral sculpture from Athens in the sixth and fifth centuries BC. Of the others, two contain votive sculptures and the corresponding references, and gravestones and their references. Each table is available on this site in a report in .pdf format: votives and the votives references are combined in one file, and so are gravestones and the corresponding references. A readme if provided at the beginning of each pdf for abbreviations and reading instructions. For the original Access database format, please contact the author stating your purpose with the database, your affiliation and how the database will be referenced.
Please download as needed from the attachments on this site. For all academic or creative use of the database, please acknowledge authorship and apply full citations.
The phenomenon of optical correction in classical Greek sculpture has been attested to by ancient authors such as Plato, as well as modern scholars. The apparent normalcy of optical correction in sculpture is, however, not self-evident. How such correction worked, whether it was based in philosophical or optical theories, and how widely spread it was among sculptors, are questions which are rarely examined systematically.
In this study, asymmetries (as one possible method of achieving optical correction) in the heads of extant fifth-century sculpture have been analysed in relation to the ideal view and the pose of the statues. All heads which were measured were asymmetrical, but statistical analysis showed that there is no systematic pattern in this dataset which could be considered representative for sculpture from classical Greece in general.
Yet this lack of statistical significance does not mean that asymmetries do not require explanation. Seven interviewed sculptors pointed out practical and technical reasons why asymmetries would occur naturally during carving, in modern as in ancient sculpture, without conscious or theoretical designs behind them."""
At the same time, Larson (2013) has shown that expert individuals traveling into a craft community from the outside had important roles in the exchange of knowledge that is the key element in successful networks. Arguably, such individuals can be found in the Athenian sculpture record of the late archaic periods, and a more or less sedentary community was also present.
The increased creativity and development of new knowledge that networks can generate if the conditions are right seem to apply in the Athenian context of this period, offering a possible explanation for the artistic flourish in the sculpture of this time.
Ownership hinges on three engrained human motivations, that concern control over the environment, belonging, and self-identification. Adding creative labour as a factor suggests that craftsmen feel a deep sense of psychological ownership not only of objects they produce but also of the ability to make them and the processes needed to do so.
By applying these concepts on 'the rise of the craftsman' in classical Athenian votives and tombstones, an argument can tentatively be put forward that the (self-)identification that these monuments portray is rooted in a greater sense of psychological ownership, and puts the emphasis of these monuments on a much more personal plane than is usually assumed in classical scholarship.
My proposal is that House F served to work up pigments into paints. Glass and glue production, as well as the creation of bone tools, may also have taken place here or they may have been side-products to the paint shop. The paint was in all likelihood produced specifically for colouring the sculpture which the street is known for, as well as the building programme on the Akropolis, to which it is in part contemporary.
This paper will investigate the dynamic between the organisation of the craft and the image it had in Greek society in the Classical and Hellenistic periods. First, archaeological and epigraphic evidence can shed light on key aspects of the organisation of the sculpture trade, such as formal education of apprentices, specialisation in material or genre, and marketing of sculpture. Lexical variety in sculptural terminology shows advanced levels of communication about various sculptural disciplines as well as a wide range of activities within them, indicating that the work involved in sculpture was thoroughly specialised and equipped with the necessary vocabulary for internal and external use.
Thus, the evidence suggests that sculpture was a highly professional and well-regarded career option. The question remains why its image in Classical texts appears much less positive. While the aim of this paper is neither a philosophical debate nor an overview of sculptors in Greek literature, some questions will be raised regarding the treatment of sculptors in Plato and other sources. In particular, it will delve into the issue whether this negative image of the sculpture craft can be taken as representative of societal views at large. This especially needs consideration as the sculpture practice outlined earlier seems to tell a different tale.
This paper will investigate two modes of competition of Athenian sculpture in the sixth and fifth centuries BC: of craftsmen and of their clients, who commissioned sculpture as dedications of gravestones. It will draw on quantitative and qualitative archaeological evidence, parallels from vase painting, and ancient texts. The argument proposed is that although sculpture was erected in public places, these were not an effective arena for political or status-related competition of those who set up sculpture. Neither iconography, epigraphy, nor archaeological settings of these monuments indicate that socio-political considerations played a major role in the decisions to order and erect sculpture.
In this paper, the elitist image of sculpture production and its social context, in the particular case of sixth and fifth-century Athens, is contested by applying two theoretical frameworks to a variety of sources. The first is the theory of horizontal and vertical specialisation in ancient economies (e.g. Greene 2000). Contrary to common perception, sculptural practice in archaic and classical Athens had relatively high levels of vertical specialisation, in which specialist craftsmen other than sculptors contributed considerably to final products. This claim is supported by archaeological evidence from original statues, excavations, and an analysis of sculpture terminology in ancient texts.
Second is the concept of Art Worlds, which entails that works of art are ‘…joint products of all the people who cooperate via an art world’s conventions to bring works like that into existence’ (Becker 1984, 34-5). Thus, not only sculptors but other groups must be taken into account when looking at the production of ancient sculpture, including various kinds of craftsmen, patrons, and even audiences. From this point of view, comments on sculpture by (near-)contemporaries such as Plato take on a new meaning, since they too are part of the art world of sculpture.
In conclusion, a contextual approach to the archaic and classical sculpture from Athens allows us to shed some of the bias which classical archaeology has developed over the centuries, and to look at these famous works of art in a new light. The combination of an inclusive approach to sculpture production and a wide variety of sources enables a more practical and realistic view of what it meant to make sculpture in and for Athenians society in the sixth and fifth centuries BC.
""
Studies on Classical sculpture as a rule focus either on aesthetics or on the socio-political meanings of sculpture. While the latter approach in particular is fully warranted for the architectural sculpture of fifth-century Athens, it is questionable whether it applies to the same degree for private sculpture, that is, monuments ordered by private individuals commemorating private events.
The relative abundance of primary evidence for Athenian sculpture in the Classical period allows for a bottom-up approach to interpreting this corpus, and especially the dual question of how it was commissioned and produced. Focusing on stelai, this lecture will trace the process of creating private sculpture in fifth-century Athens, from the moment of commission through various production phases to the final effect in sanctuaries or burial grounds.
The evidence from workshops and quarries suggests that the practicalities of production, of supply and demand and a relatively specialized labour market in sculpture were strong influences on the look of Athenian sculpture in this period. By examining the appearance of 'average' stelai and their quantitative development over time, it will be proposed that such practical aspects weighed more heavily with Athenian patrons than considerations of status display or political motivations.
To put the existence of systematic asymmetries to the test, a group of plaster casts as well as original marble statues from the fifth century have been measured and the results submitted to two types of statistical testing.
Though no systematic pattern could be found, the variability of the results suggests a wider range of causes for the asymmetries. These should be sought in the design and the practicalities of the carving process, such as the marble type, left or right-handedness of the sculptor and our inability to see around corners, i.e. observe the effect of carving one side on the other sides of the statue.
In this poster, I present some preliminary results of my PhD thesis which suggest that in fact, political motivations had little to do with the choices for sculpted votive or funerary monuments. Quantitative analysis shows that the assumption of conspicuous consumption of sculpture in archaic and classical Athens is in many respects tenuous. Instead, I suggest a number of practical reasons - transport and trade infrastructures, the development of a more vertically specialised network of craftsmen, a rudimentary market thanks to continuous work opportunities, etc. - which had a much greater impact on the choices for certain types of dedications or gravestones than has previously been thought."
In the archaic period, the painted surfaces are as yet literal, in the sense that they represent what, for example, cloth would do when stretched out over a bent leg. In the 5th and 4th centuries, this developed in a pictorial approach, where the groove between folds were overemphasised: not only would the carved folds cast shadows, these were then painted in a darker variant of the colour of the element of the statue or relief, for a more dramatic visual effect.
This development coincides with advances in optical theory - e.g. by Democritus - as well as a concern with the illusionary nature of art - Plato, reflecting that the development was well noted by contemporary theorists.
As the work of perception psychologist Semir Zeki has shown, the visual cortex in the human brain consists of multiple areas specialising in different aspects of visual perception, such as motion, colour or dynamic form. The separation of shape and colour in this process is essential to understand our visual percpetion of sculpture. A white three-dimensional surface is far more difficult to come to terms with visually than a coloured one. The addition of a pattern to a colourful surface further eases visual grasp of the shape.
The rich patterning of archaic sculpture may, consciously or not, have served to enhance the shape of the sculptures, and to help let these shapes appear more rounded and real to the viewers. In classical times, when such enhancements was not necessary any longer, the painted surface of sculpture moves to a pictorial, illusionist approach. Colour and patterns on sculpture no longer follow and enhance the carved shape suggested under the surface, but intensify shadows by painting groves and depressions darker, even if these shadows would naturally be formed by the play of light on the surface."
Each label or ascription is linked to specific behaviours (e.g. political posture). Moreover, specific feelings are connected to (self-)identity, determining how we behave towards others. Outward behaviours, appearances and accessories are what indicates, out of choice or necessity, whether someone belongs, is weird, or worthy of esteem. A level of judgement is also involved, and while labels have always been part of our judgements and categorization of people’s identities, there is far more fluidity and ambiguity in label ascription than we tend to think, both now and in the past.
In archaeology, traditional identities along the lines of, for example, male/female, Greek/foreign, craftsperson/landowner, free/enslaved, etc., are not easily determined. People have always had multiple identities, fluid and ambiguous, based on many factors in endlessly varied combinations. This session will address the ways in which ancient craftspeople and labourers shaped their multivalent identities through a range of markers, some chosen, some ascribed by others.
SUBMISSION DEADLINE AUGUST 31st
Organizers: Helle Hochscheid (University College Roosevelt/Utrecht University) and Ben Russell (Edinburgh University)
This panel investigates the relation between production processes and value attribution in ancient crafts. In the process of making things, it is the craftsperson who shapes functionality and value of artefacts. She/he is, however, never a lone force but depends on networks of suppliers, fellow craftspeople, consumers, wider audiences, the material conditions for the application of craft, and more ephemeral considerations like aesthetics or religious value. Ancient economic history, especially from an archaeological perspective, tends to focus, with good reason, on the objects produced by craftspeople, on form and style, and on distribution. Typological approaches, necessary for sorting and analyzing large bodies of material evidence, have also prioritized the form of finished artefacts and, when they have been applied to part-worked objects, have tended to concentrate on identifying discrete stages in production processes. The maker, as an individual, responding to their own needs as well as those of their customers, is often absent from this picture. In recent sociological and anthropological studies, the role of makers as individuals trained in a particular way, responding to their materials, and operating in a wider network of production, has been more obviously stressed. Key recent works include Tim Ingold's Making: Anthropology, Archaeology, Art and Architecture (2013), Richard Sennett's The Craftsman (2008), David Miller's edited volume Materiality (2005) and even more specialized studies written by practicing craftspeople, like Peter Korn's Why We Make Things & Why It Matters (2013). This panel will bring together scholars interested in making and the role of the maker to discuss what new anthropological and sociological approaches might add to our understanding of ancient craft production and valuation. Among the topics explored in the panel are:
- Interaction between craftspeople and the users of their products
- Economic value in relation to other types of value attribution
- The role of different participants in the chaine opératoire, and indeed the validity of this term
- Training of craftspeople and its impact on production
- The concept of materiality and its meaning to how craft products are used and valued
The aim is to cover multiple periods and media, with papers on Aegean, Greek and Roman material, sculpture, mosaics and other forms of craft production.
We all have preferences, some things we like, others we don't, some people we love, while hating others. This is such a universal phenomenon that we hardly devote time to realising how important it is. The underlying psychological processes we let automatically make decisions for us. They guide our behaviour and our choices, actually they make – or break – our lives. The concepts of liking and identification are equally relevant to cultural objects like protagonists that appear in novels, iconic art works or landmarks, and also to components in communicative processes, like the Aristotelian notion of ethos in classical rhetorical theory.
This Research Topic will be approached from a number of disciplines. We call for theoretical and empirical contributions from linguistics, rhetoric, perception psychology, emotion psychology, cognitive science, embodied/situated cognition and phenomenology. We can think of a range of cultural and communicative application areas where issues of liking and identification can be studied within a cognitive and/or neurocognitive framework including literature, the visual arts, music, dance, past and present material culture, speech making, news/political discourse, consumer products, advertising, food, etc. The roles of consciousness and non-consciousness, emotion and cognition, and memory, motor action and perception will undoubtedly be of significance in the papers that will appear in this Research Topic.
Important Note:
All submissions/contributions to this Research Topic must be in line with the scope of the journal and section they are submitted to. While authors are encouraged to draw from other disciplines to complement their papers where relevant, they must ensure papers fall within the section, as expressed in its Scope, with a primary focus on psychology theory and content.
Due to limited seats available, please RSVP: nia@nia.gr or 210 9210760.
We hope to be able to welcome you to the keynote lecture or/and the student presentations.