Essay #2b: Completeness and Truth
Question: How is it possible that what the Egyptians considered "completeness", could be misinterpreted as crude, naïve or unrealistic and how does it affect the “truth” contained in their art?
Part One
Summary: I didn't have much trouble answering this question because I already had a lot of prior knowledge on the subject of ancient Egypt. I always found it interesting how they based everything off of mathematics and a lot of their architecture seemed to have to do with astronomy. I always wondered how they could be so accurate without much evidence of complicated machinery and tools.
Reason: The reason this question was created was to have to the student view art and even math in a different light. It was created to have the student search for information about Egyptian art in the textbook and decide how they would answer.
Purpose: The purpose of this question is to show the student a different perspective. It was created to give the student a new perspective.
Direction: The direction of my research has brought me to believe ancient Egyptians were smart.
Impressions: My impressions are that ancient Egyptians are not crude, naïve or unrealistic in anyway, they are in fact the complete opposite.
Part Two
What the Egyptians considered “completeness,” could be misinterpreted as crude, naïve, or unrealistic by the modern person, which could in turn affect the “truth” contained in their art. Crude can mean many things but in this case it means simple or lacking something. Egyptian art can easily be interpreted as naïve, meaning that it is unsophisticated. It may be viewed this way because of the structure of their buildings, the way they depicted humans, or what they depicted in art. I don't see Egyptian art in this way though, so it all depends on the viewer. When looking at Egyptian art, I feel the complete opposite.
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(http://ancientworldwonders.com/uploads/Pyramids_of_Giza.jpg) |
What many modern viewers don't know is that almost all of Egyptian architecture and art is based on mathematics. This is anything but crude, naïve or unrealistic. Many stones used to create different structures are too heavy for a modern day crane to even carry. The word crude implies that the Egyptians were unprepared, sloppy and unintelligent. This is definitely not the case. An example of this architecture is the Great Pyramids at Giza. “The site was carefully planned to follow the sun's east-west path” (Art History, Marilyn Stokstad, Michael W. Cothren, Pg.57). This implies that the ancient Egyptians were extremely far advanced. “The designers who oversaw the building of such massive structures were capable of the most sophisticated mathematical calculations. They oriented the pyramids to the points of the compass and may have incorporated other symbolic astronomical calculations as well” (Art History, Marilyn Stokstad, Michael W. Cothren, Pg.57). It's pretty obvious to me based on the photo above that the pyramids were meant to look the way they do. If one single mathematical calculation was off, the entire pyramid could've collapsed, so these people were anything but naïve, crude or unrealistic.
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(http://witcombe.sbc.edu/menkaure/images/menkaure.jpg) |
People may view the above statue, Menkaure and His Queen, and wonder, why would the egyptians feel the need to create people to look this way? They might even see it and not appreciate it for what it is and might view it as unsightly. For the Egyptians, they view this as a new way to create sculpture. Before, they were only capable of creating statues of people standing straight up. For them to create a statue making a step forward, this is an amazing new discovery and has a lot of meaning to them. “The forms of the sculpture - the measured grid of strong verticals and counterbalancing horizontals, the stiff, artificial postures, the overall idealized anatomical shapes of the bodies combined with naturalistic details - are read not simply as indicative of Egyptian taste, but as representative of the fundamental character of Egyptian culture” (http://witcombe.sbc.edu/menkaure/menkaurediscovery.html). This shows how the Egyptians felt about their looks, culture, and how they appeared to others. It seems as though they were very keen on perfection, based on how they use math. Even if they didn't necessarily look as they looked in carvings, paintings, and statues, that is how they wished to look, or saw themselves.
A modern person might view this and wonder why everything looks like it was drawn so simply. As a modern viewer myself, I first notice the way their feet are both going towards the same direction, even though they are pictured walking. But then, I look more closely and notice at the bottom left what looks like grid paper I used in Algebra class. This shows the ancient Egyptians obsession with perfection. They depicted themselves the way they did simply because they wanted to be remembered in a certain way. I think they did a good job of this. “One of the most striking features of the lowest register of this stele is its unfinished state. The two leftmost figures were left uncarved, but the stone surface still maintains the preparatory ink drawing meant to guide the sculptor, preserving striking evidence of a system of canonical figure proportions that was established in the Middle Kingdom” (Art History, Marilyn Stokstad, Michael W. Cothren, Pg.64). This implies the opposite of crude or naïve. They were very intricate and detailed in their work, and cared very much about it. Some things may have been a bit unrealistic, but not enough to be considered unimportant.
In the photo above it shows the Temple of Ramses II. The men sitting down in their thrones may be viewed from a modern perspective and seen as crude, naïve, or unrealistic, based on their appearance. A viewer may see this and automatically think that these men are not proportionate. Their legs look a bit wide compared to their upper bodies and their hands and arms look flat. It may look off to us, but to them it was a new found way to sculpt, and they took advantage of it. Over time, their sculptures become more accurate.
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| ( http://www.oldworldartisans.com/images/Web%20Pages/Fresco%20Styles/Queen_Nefertari_making_an_offering_to_Isis,_tomb_of_Nefertari,_Valley_of_the_Queens,_1279-1212_BC.jpg) |
“Her slender limbs, ample hips, and more prominent breasts contrast with the uniformly slender female figures of the New Kingdom” (Art History, Marilyn Stokstad, Michael W. Cothren, Pg.78). The first sculpture is Karomama, which is from around 945-715 BCE. The second painting, is from 1290-1224 BCE (Art History, Marilyn Stokstad, Michael W. Cothren, Pg.76-78). This shows how over time they learned how to create more accurate representations of people. In the first sculpture, the woman is shown taking a step forward and also holding her arms up as if she is carrying something. They did this because it was new and amazing for them to be able to sculpt people in different positions of movement.
What the ancient Egyptians considered to be “completeness”, could easily be misinterpreted as crude, naïve, or unrealistic which effects the “truth” contained in their art. To the ancient Egyptians, “completeness” is “truth” because that is what makes sense to them. What was right to them might not seem right to a modern person because many people are only capable of seeing things from their own point of view and not anyone else's. Based on all of the above pieces of art and architecture, I think it's easy to say that ancient Egyptians were very intelligent, logical, and mathematical.
Ally - Glad the image issues were overcome - it was worth the effort as evidenced by your essay! What I like about this essay says a lot about you. You are focused. You are driven and you like things to be, well - complete. You did touch on how this "exercise" helped you to, "...
ReplyDeleteview art and even math in a different light..." And, as such, that insight allowed you to post a very solid response to the question. On a scale of 1 to 4, this was a 3.85