Ancient Greek Sculptors

"Ancient tradition considered Lysippos to be self-taught, because not only would he have arisen from humble origins, that is, he would have been a tinker from the beginning (Plin. XXXIV, 61), but he would have listened to the advice of the painter Eupompos, who, when asked which of the previous artists he would have followed, he would have pointed out the crowd of men, telling him that it was necessary to imitate nature and not an artist. (Alessandro Della Seta)"

"The ancients magnified in him the elegance, the extreme finesse of the execution; and in fact we still find something surprising in the best copies, such as that of the apoxyomenos. But beyond this we noticed another characteristic trait: the common movement, as a hereditary temperament, to all figures even when the situation does not require it. Well: in this movement, in its peculiar manifestation, it represents a substantial progress in the development of sculpture. (Emanuel Löwy)"

"The art of Lysippus presents itself as a Doric reaction against Attic art, which played an increasing part in sentiment and could seem soft and sensual. Lysippus modified the Canon of Polycletus, i.e. the classical tradition of the fifth century, with a more pronounced tendency towards elegance, giving the body almost eight times the length of the head (instead of seven), making the joints and muscles stand out at the expense of their fleshy envelope. His heads express neither meditation nor passion, they are limited to being nervous and refined. (Solomon Reinach)"

"Lysippos was considered for the human figure as the creator of a canon opposite to that of Polycletus. He, while remaining faithful to symmetry, that is to a rule of proportions between the various parts of the body, modified the firm and square stature of the Polycletian type and, by making the head smaller and the body more frail and drier, he created figures that appeared of greater slenderness. This is the appearance of Apoxyomenos and Agias. (Alessandro Della Seta)"

"Apoxyomenos"

"Famous work of a great contemporary master of Phidias, of Argive Polycletus, is the so-called doryphorus, i.e. the statue of a winning athlete holding a spear in his left hand. In this figure the movement of the trunk is shown as it follows from that of the legs: the body gravitates on the right leg and therefore, precisely as anatomy requires, the side of the right side rises, the shoulder descends, and from this general movement results minor shifts in the intermediate parts of the trunk. No one could describe this attitude as awkward; the figure, although firm, moves freely, articulated, lightly. And with this art can boast of an acquired capital. [...] [Polycletus] was the first to fully satisfy the postulates of anatomical truth. (Emanuel Löwy)"

"He was the first to establish single-legged figures; he was the first to determine the proportions with a book on symmetry, and with a statue entirely in conformity with his precepts, which he named the Canon or the Regulus. For this work the architects regarded him as a legislator; and therefore it probably follows that the Greek statues, as reflects, appear to have almost all been created with the same fundamental laws, and emerged, so to speak, from the same school. (Luigi Antonio Lanzi)"

"Polycletus is, after Phidias, the most respected name in the history of . In the idea of ​​beauty and diligence he is placed before anyone else by Quintilian and Strabo. Measuring his talent with that of Phidias, he did not dare compete with him in the most sublime character: he occupied himself with forming youthful simulacrums. Some among Quintilian believed that under his men grew in beauty; but the Gods diminished. (Luigi Antonio Lanzi)"

"Polycletus was a sublime poet in his art, and tried to surpass the beauty of nature itself in his figures: therefore his imagination was mainly concerned with youthful forms, so he will undoubtedly be better able to express the softness of a Bacchus, or the flourishing youth of an Apollo, than the robustness of a Hercules, or the mature age of an Aesculapius. For this reason those who wanted to blame him said that they wanted greater expression in his figures, that is, that the parts were more strongly indicated. (Johann Joachim Winckelmann)"

"Statue of Zeus in Olympia"

"What would Phidias have done in a small and obscure state? Without great means, without him having been a protector of artists, he would not have had the opportunity to conceive and create great works. The sublime was born in him from the greatness of the concepts and this greatness was also born from the means and the purpose he had. (Ettore De Ruggiero)"

"And even if it were possible to establish models and precedents for all the individual details [of the Athena Parthenos], there would still be some novelty: in their union, in the profound religious and patriotic conception }} so the artist recast all those elements in an effigy of the goddess never seen before. What if this were his only work; and if Phidias had done nothing other than gather together in a victorious synthesis all the acquisitions of archaism, he would deserve his highest place in the history of art. (Emanuel Löwy)"

"The great genius of the Athenian Phidias, who established himself as dominant towards the middle of the [5th century B.C.E.] century, was able [...] to rise into the Olympic sphere to give an art form to the conception of divinity, interpreting the noblest religious ideal of his time, making men and creating the classical style. (Giovanni Becatti)"

"The forms, like those of Phidias, also have their development in the static. [...] No one else, after Phidias, has retained this respectful gravity and this conscious enthusiasm towards life which are true religion. (Edgar Faure)"

"There is nothing essential to find in art after Phidias and Raphael, but there is always more to be done, even after them, to maintain the cult of truth and to perpetuate the tradition of beauty. (Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres)"

"Something in his character must have made him an enemy of men, since no one loved him. Yet he was not only a great sculptor, but also a great master, who, in addition to having created a style, also made it a school, transmitting its rules to students such as Agoracritus and Alcamene, continuers of the "classical". (Indro Montanelli)"

"A whole world of , of heroes and men in a cosmic vision of myth and in a divinization of reality had been created [in the Parthenon] by the creative imagination of this demiurge, master of all techniques, in a form that was the highest and perfect implementation of the classical ideal, working almost animated by a divine enthusiasm. (Giovanni Becatti)"

"There are two tendencies [in Greek art], that of generalizing the individual and this was of Myron and his school, and the other of individualizing the divinities even more, and this was from Phidias and his school. (Ettore De Ruggiero)"

"Statue of Zeus in Olympia"

"Athena Promachos"

"Lemnian Athena"

"Athena Parthenos"

"Aphrodite Urania statue at Elis"

"Athena statue at Elis"

"Statue of youth at Olympia"

"[Homer]], The Iliad with an English Translation by A.T. Murray, Ph.D. in two volumes. Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. C.E.1924. Online version at the Perseus Digital Library."

"Lapatin, Kenneth D. S., Chryselephantine Statuary in the Ancient Mediterranean World, Oxford University Press (C.E.2001) ISBN 0-19-815311-2"

"Macrobius, Saturnalia, Volume II: Books 3-5, edited and translated by Robert A. Kaster, Loeb Classical Library No. 511, Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, C.E.2011. ISBN 978-0-674-99649-6. Online version at Harvard University Press."

"Mallwitz, Alfred and Wolfgang Schiering, Die Werkstatt des Pheidias in Olympia I: Olympische Forschungen V, Berlin: Walter de Gruyter (C.E.1964)"

"McWilliam, Janette; Puttock, Sonia; Stevenson, Tom, eds. (C.E.2011). The Statue of Zeus at Olympia: New Approaches. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4438-3032-4."

"Schiering, Wolfgang, Die Werkstatt des Pheidias in Olympia II: Werkstattfunde: Olympische Forschungen XVIII, Berlin: Walter de Gruyter (C.E.1991) ISBN 3-11-012468-8"

"Strabo, Geography, translated by Horace Leonard Jones; Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann, Ltd. (C.E.1924). LacusCurtis, Online version at the Perseus Digital Library, Books 6–14."