Title
Vase Painting, Gender, and Social Identity in Archaic Athens
Department/School
Art History
Date
2006
Document Type
Book
Keywords
vase painting, Greece, ancient vases, Athens, spectators in art, gender roles
Abstract
Spectators at the sides of narrative vase paintings have long been at the margins of scholarship, but a study of their appearance shows that they provide a model for the ancient viewing experience. They also reflect social and gender roles in archaic Athens. This study explores the phenomenon of spectators through a database built from a census of the Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum, which reveals that the figures flourished in Athenian vase painting during the last two-thirds of the sixth century B.C.E. Using models developed from the psychoanalysis and the theory of the gaze, ritual studies, and gender studies, this book shows how these "spectators" emerge as models for social and gender identification in the archaic city, encoding in their gestures and behavior archaic attitudes about gender and status
Published in
Vase painting, gender, and social identity in archaic Athens
Citation/Other Information
Stansbury-O'Donnell, Mark D. Vase Painting, Gender, and Social Identity in Archaic Athens. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006.