Greek Vase Painting: The Gods in Red and Black
For nearly four centuries (c. 700-300 BCE), the potters and painters of Athens produced a body of decorated ceramic art that constitutes one of the richest visual archives of Greek mythology and daily life that survives. Working in two successive techniques — black-figure (figures painted in black silhouette on red clay) and red-figure (figures left in red clay against a black background, allowing greater detail in musculature and expression) — they depicted the full range of the Greek mythological universe: the labors of Heracles, the Trojan War, the loves of the gods, the underworld, the Dionysiac mysteries, the athletic festivals. These were not luxury objects for aristocratic display alone; they were functional vessels — amphorae for wine and oil, kraters for mixing wine at symposia, cups for drinking — whose images accompanied the rituals of daily life, making the mythological universe present at every meal, every libation, every athletic competition. Achilles ...