Animations of Ancient Vase Scenes in the Classics Classroom by Sonya Nevin

from a scene on an ancient vase. I was be enthusiastic about watching and Introduction playing Well-Wishers http://www.panoply. learning through video. For this reason, it org.uk/well-wishers.html#.VKmCSJVybIU is important for Classics as a discipline to ‘That’s amazing! I can see what he’s doing.’ on a loop behind me as I prepared for the be able to respond by offering classically- These words, from a thirteen-year old boy session; they saw a dexiosis scene on a themed video material of a high standard. in London, were extremely encouraging. classical amphora come to life, with a Some material of this sort does of course Moments earlier he had been complaining departing warrior bidding farewell to his exist. The Classics Confidential http:// that our imminent ancient history session family. The interest sparked by Well- classicsconfidential.co.uk/ interviews are would stop him playing pool. At his Wishers drew them in for the start of the an excellent example of research in an words, his friends looked up from online session and, as the session went on, they accessible format. Ray Lawrence’s gaming, and they too began taking an seemed to feel rewarded for their cartoons about childhood in Rome (made interest in images of ancient vases and continued attention by the occasional by Cognitive Media) https://www.youtube. learning about ancient warfare. An hour playing of further vase animations. Where com/watch?v=juWYhMoDTN0 are later they hit the pool tables, but for the a static image might well have fallen flat as research-backed yet light-hearted and duration of our after-school session, these a visual aid, animation rose to the accessible. The Panoply vase animations fill reluctant learners had engaged well and occasion. an important niche by offering videos that taken real pleasure in finding out about Video and online content play a focus on ancient artefacts. In this article I the ancient world. greater part in people’s lives than ever will outline what materials the Panoply Vase The material that sparked that vital before. Young people in particular tend to Animation Project has available and several initial interest was an animation made straightforward ways to include them in a teaching session. I have made extensive use of the animations for teaching BA students, children and teenagers, and many teachers have shared positive feedback about using them. The remarks that follow will be based on these experiences.

The Panoply Vase Animation Project

Animator Steve Simons and I create these vase animations in order to increase engagement with and understanding of ancient vases and classical culture. Steve Figure 1. | A Screenshot from Well-Wishers, made from an Attic amphora (Beazley 9028595). works as closely as possible with the

The Journal of Classics Teaching 16 (31) p.32-37 © The Classical Association 2015. This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, Downloaded32 fromdistribution, https://www.cambridge.org/core and reproduction in any. IP medium, address: provided 170.106.35.76 the original, on 27 Sepwork 2021 is unaltered at 11:06:22 and, subject is properly to the cited. Cambridge The written Core termspermis ofsion use, of available Cambridge at University Press https://www.cambridge.org/core/termsmust be obtained for commercial. https://doi.org/10.1017/S2058631015000057 re-use or in order to create a derivative work. original images, meaning that the museum outreach projects, Ure View and vase that most Classical Civilisation animations keep people’s attention on the Ure Discovery.1 More recently, MA students students study, but the essential benefits actual artefacts. In the case of Well- at University College Dublin developed apply to the study of any vases. Wishers, the dexiosis scene is simply acted the plot of The Procession www.panoply. Communicating the arts of paying out and the men shake hands. Likewise, in org.uk/the-procession.html as part of a close attention and observing detail are The Runners http://www.panoply.org.uk/ module on material culture.2 The core elements of Classical Civilisation the-runners.html#.VKmFcpVybIU, students’ knowledge of ancient culture teaching; when it comes to vase athletes depicted on a fragment run across equipped them to interpret the vase scene iconography, the animations encourage the shard, acting out the scene in which effectively and they had the guidance of both. Watching the animations is an they appear. Others are more involved, curator Jo Day and myself to help them enjoyable activity in itself, which telling short stories that explore the to develop a story that would be of contributes to a relaxed and open actions and relationships depicted in the educational benefit to viewers as well as atmosphere that is conducive to learning. original scenes. Steve’s knowledge of being enjoyable to watch. Most of the That makes for a minute well-spent, but physiology and fighting techniques animations are around 30 seconds to a there are aspects that develop this benefit informs the movements of the figures; he minute in length, the exception being further. The pleasure of watching has said of this work that, ‘Paying 2014’s Hoplites! Greeks at War, which is animations encourages students to keep attention to the small details of eight minutes. In 2012 we launched www. looking at the vase scenes, extending their movements, such as the slight sway of panoply.org.uk, which make the concentration on (and potentially their standing characters, blinking, and the animations available online, complete interest in) the iconography. Through the head movements people make when they with educational resources and guidance story content they are helped to are watching others, can make all the on the manner in which the animations understand the themes in the scenes, difference in producing a believable interpret and represent myths and history. while the movement helps them to notice animation.’ I advise on aspects of ancient visual clues by drawing their attention to culture that are relevant to the look of the Teaching about vases details. One of the advantages of teaching action, on reconstruction, and on aspects iconography with animation is that the of the characters’ behaviour. In some When Greek vases themselves are the movement is itself an aid to learning. Take cases, such as Hoplites! Greeks at War topic of a teaching session, the Achilles’ helmet on the Exekias vase, for http://www.panoply.org.uk/everysoldier. animations make a particularly useful example. The introduction of movement html#.VKGOoDpABg, Clash of the Dicers resource. Ideally students would watch through the animation of the helmet http://www.panoply.org.uk/clash-of-the- the animations before, during or after a forces greater recognition of its presence. dicers.html#.VLfP2pVybIU, and Hermes’ visit to a vase gallery, when watching the So if a teacher wishes students to Favour www.panoply.org.uk/hermes- animations would enrich and extend the remember that one of the heroes is favour.html we worked together to impact of the visit, but they also support wearing a helmet, or which one of them is develop the storylines of the animations vase-study conducted in the classroom wearing a helmet, or all the things that (Nevin, 2015). In others, the stories were alone.3 Clash of the Dicers is the strongest they want to tell them about the planned by teenagers engaged on the example, as it is made from an Exekias significance of the helmet, the fact that those students have seen it move in Clash means that the information is more likely to register long-term.4 With animations made from vases that are not the specific topic of study, learners still benefit from the greater sense they gain of the way in which the various details in a scene contribute to the meaning of the whole. Because of the animation of body parts, with muscles working and limbs moving, the contrasts between different styles of vase and different qualities of pieces are more pronounced in animation than in static images. For this reason, comparing the black figures in Dance Off http://www.panoply.org.uk/dance-off. html#.VMPpdpVybIU with the red figures in The Procession www.panoply.org. uk/the-procession.html will help to demonstrate the difference between these two styles. Static images demonstrate the principle; animation can re-enforce and Figure 2. | MA students, Eoin and Courtney, planning a vase animation for the University clarify it. Vase animations can also help College Dublin Classical Museum. learners to recognise the dynamic

Downloaded from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 170.106.35.76Animations of, on Ancient 27 Sep Vase2021 Scenesat 11:06:22 in the, subject Classics to the Classroom Cambridge Core terms of use, available at 33 https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S2058631015000057 the topic alone makes an animation such as The Runners or The Cheat http://www. panoply.org.uk/clash-of-the-dicers. html#.VKGOeDpABg appropriate. When the running scene comes to life, the athletics theme of the decoration is emphasised and reinforced through action. In Hoplites! Greeks at War, www. panoply.org.uk/everysoldier.html#. VKGOoDpABg, a warrior trains, sacrifices, fights and celebrates victory. Hoplites! therefore complements classes on topics such as citizenship or ancient warfare, or on something more specific such as the Peloponnesian War. The vase’s fight scene is expanded into a more Figure 3. | A quarrel breaks out in Clash of the Dicers, made from Exekias’ amphora, (Vatican extensive depiction of combat, Museum 344). emphasising and reinforcing the vase’s original decorative theme. Key topics potential of the vase scenes they are A mentioned above, Clash of the are illustrated by the events of the studying. Students who are new to vases Dicers depicts Achilles and Ajax gaming. animations while their grounding in ancient can struggle to interpret implied movement Panoply has had lots of positive artwork keeps the illustrating material as implied movement. When they watch responses from teachers in the UK and artefact-based and communicates classical any vase animations it can help them to beyond who have shown this animation as culture’s own exploration of those topics. make that step to interpret further scenes part of an introduction to the Trojan War. These are some of the topics that of implied movement more readily and Teachers can simply show Clash of the can be enlivened by Panoply animations: more thoroughly.5 In this sense, watching Dicers as a piece of extra media in their vase animations with students teaches session, supporting an introduction to the • Athletics and Sports: The Cheat, them to be more active (as well as, characters, to the Trojan War or to its Runners, The Love of Honour, Dance Off, perhaps, more engaged) interpreters of popularity as a subject in ancient art. The Pelops, Hoplites! Greeks at War, Hermes’ vase scenes. They are more able to lack of dialogue in the animations has Favour. recognise that scenes of implied movement helped to make them popular contain an inherently dynamic quality. internationally. In addition to the • Citizenship: Well-Wishers (for family or thousands of international views for warfare as a citizen’s duty), Hoplites! Choosing animations by theme identifiable through web analytics, we Greeks at War. have received feedback from teachers Vase animations can make a useful including a secondary-school Classics • Gods, Goddesses, and Religion: contribution to classes even when vases teacher in Costa Rica who shows the Eros and Aphrodite, Sirens (includes themselves are not the specified subject animation within introductions to the Persephone’s abduction), The Procession; under discussion. When the subject Iliad, and a secondary-school language Hoplites! Greeks at War, Hoplites! trailer matter of an animation corresponds to teacher in Athens who wanted something (both feature a liver examination), The the subject of the session, vase informal and recognisably Troy-themed Cheat, Runners, Hermes’ Favour. animations offer a lively aid and can be that the students could discuss in French. used to springboard into related Similarly, when it is time to teach • Horses / Chariots: The Cheat, Amazon, activities. ancient athletics or the Olympic Games, Pelops.

Figures 4 and 5. | Watching animations of different styles of vases helps to clarify the nature of those differences, as with Dance Off (left), Ure Museum, (REDMG: 1951.130.1) and The Procession (right) (UCD Classical Museum, UCD 197).

Downloaded34 from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 170.106.35.76Animations, on of 27 Ancient Sep 2021 Vase at 11:06:22Scenes ,in subject the Classics to the Cambridge Classroom Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S2058631015000057 • Monsters: Plant Food, Sirens, Heracles, story created by teenagers, Hippodameia’s with a scalable lesson plan and slides, and Medusa. father is delayed because he is drinking. an extensive collection of example After watching the animation together, a artwork which has been collected from • Myth: Clash of the Dicers, Pandora, teacher might ask their students to work project workshops. Even if a teacher had Heracles, Pelops, Medusa, Amazon, Sirens, together by discussing the different never taught an ancient warfare topic Eros and Aphrodite. impacts that are created by the different before, the combination of materials versions. What are the differences in the stories’ would make it straightforward to deliver a • Symposium: The Love of Honour. messages? Which do they prefer? Why? This is a class. great way to get students thinking about • Troy / Homer: Clash of the Dicers, myth, particularly as it will raise their Activities Amazon. awareness of the existence of different (sometimes contradictory) mythic Animations offer a springboard to a host • Warfare: Hoplites! Greeks at War, traditions. It is also an effective way to of further activities. The activities Hoplites! trailer, Well-Wishers, Combat, develop their thinking about the suggested here can be chosen or adapted Amazon, Clash of the Dicers. interpretive consequences of narrative to suit different audiences and different features. There is no right or wrong desired learning outcomes. The activity • Women: Pandora, Medusa, Amazon, answer to which tradition they prefer, so that has been explored most in relation to Sirens, Eros and Aphrodite, Well-Wishers, they can talk about the idea openly. As an the vase animations is storyboarding. Plant Food, The Love of Honour. informal activity, the animation will have Storyboarding involves planning a visual disarmed them, helping the discussion to narrative by breaking a story down into The animations can also form a focal get off to a good start; because watching key frames, showing what a scene would point for discussions. For example, in the animation feels like a fun activity, look like and providing just a small Pelops http://www.panoply.org.uk/pelops. follow-up discussions do not feel too dry amount of explanatory text. html#.VMPpxZVybIU, one of the even if the subject matter is quite Storyboarding is good for holistic chariots breaks apart. Showing the challenging. thinkers. Learners who favour that style animation could act as a focal point for a Each animation on the website respond well to the way that a big topic is discussion of chariot racing more comes with extra material to support considered overall and then broken down generally, with a teacher using the teachers in leading class discussions. into its components. It is also good for animation to stimulate learners’ interest There is information on the myths and other sorts of learners to work with too, and then to help them to think about history featured in the vase scenes and as it develops their capacity to do exactly chariots as moving vehicles. What do they animations, information on the vases that – to see the big picture as well as the know about how chariots would have worked? themselves, discussions of the constituent parts.6 This activity is now What can they deduce? Why might a chariot interpretations of the original scenes, quite widespread in teaching generally and break? Alternatively, a teacher presenting related images, links to relevant texts teachers may already use it in any number the origin of the Olympic Games might (mostly to the Perseus site), and of contexts. It is a particularly effective recount the myth of Pelops, including the suggestions for further reading and exercise for thinking about story- tradition that Pelops’ opponent, activities. Hoplites! Greeks at War, for construction. Those engaged in it must Hippodameia’s father, would start second example, is accompanied by images and decide what is important about the story in his races, staying behind to sacrifice a information about war in ancient Greece, they are communicating–what does or ram (as told by Diodorus, 4.73.4 ). In the details on the vase and its use and does not need explaining to the audience, animation’s retelling of the myth, with a creation, a downloadable activity sheet and what would need explaining to an animator or director working from this guide. The visual aspect helps to develop understanding of the different values communicated by different visual prompts. To incorporate this into a class, students could watch a vase animation or two to understand the concept. They might then look at an example storyboard, such as those provided on the website. After that they would spend time studying a vase, interpreting the scene, and then working together to develop a story from it before planning that story out as a storyboard. This activity encourages close attention and projection. They must look closely at the scene in Figure 6. | Battle scene from Hoplites! Greeks at War (above), which was created from Ure order to develop it into action and they Museum vase 56.8.8 (below, Figure 7: detail) must use their understanding of ancient

The Panoply vase animations offer Figure 7. | something that is visually stimulating and technologically intriguing with a core culture and of life more generally in order literacy is to challenge students to write element of ancient culture that to decide together what those characters reviews of a vase animation of their recommends them for use with a range of are likely to do, and what they would want choice. They might be asked to comment topics and activities. The Panoply website them to do, if they could move. on how the original scene has been www.panoply.org.uk houses all the Storyboarding with vases also draws interpreted, how the myth or history animations mentioned above; many of on the motivating power of outcome- behind the scene has been represented, them can be seen in galleries alongside orientated learning. The students are the choice of music or the movement and their accompanying vases. The website is motivated in their analysis of the artefacts actions of the figures. This could also full of example storyboards and by the fact that they are going to do involve challenging students to identify suggestions for activities. Teachers, something with the images on them. where new material has been created and university students and sixth-formers may Looking at vases ceases to be a passive incorporated, once again leading them to enjoy exploring the information on the experience; instead it becomes one of observe closely the details of the original website, including the blog which offers creative engagement, which strengthens artefact. news and interviews with academics and a their understanding of the artefacts and Another stimulating challenge is to student museum intern: http:// of characterisation, narrative, and invite learners to become virtual curators, panoplyclassicsandanimation.blogspot. communication. This activity can also help in which they must choose artefacts co.uk/2014/12/museum-internships- students to recognise the various pitfalls (perhaps from a specified online museum interview-with.html. Young (and not so and potentials of interpretation. If a class catalogue) to express a particular theme. young) people often spend a lot of time of 30 works in pairs to create 15 different They should consider audience online. Helping students to make use of interpretations of a vase scene, this will interaction with their virtual display, and Panoply’s vase animations and perhaps to help those 30 learners to recognise that might like to choose an existing animation interpretation is a subjective experience to go in their display (and explain their – their interpretation has value, but there choice), or to storyboard an animation are multiple ways that a thing can be from one of the pieces they have chosen, perceived. Learners might also be pushed like a commissioning curator. This activity to consider and discuss the nature of the offers an opportunity for learners to judge difference between a static and a moving how appropriate a piece is to the image.7 explanation of a theme. This offers a Writing scripts for the animations positive opportunity for learners to provides students with an opportunity to picture themselves in a professional role, improve their expression of character and in which thinking about the needs of their literacy. Clash of the Dicers and others challenges them to draw on their Well-Wishers work particularly well for this own knowledge and judgement. During activity. If it is practical, teachers can help the 2014 project at UCD, MA students students to record their dialogue and play had the opportunity to engage in this it along with the animation. Teachers activity for real, selecting the vase to be could watch the animations with their animated, working as a group to class, and then ask the students to storyboard the animation, and writing and consider what is happening, which setting-up a supporting exhibition. These Figure 8. | “He prays to Ares before battle to characters would talk when, and what they activities stretched them to go beyond win back his wife.” A frame from a are likely to be saying. Another means of thinking of what they would find amusing storyboard created in response to Hoplites! using this classical material to strengthen in an animation to considering themselves Greeks at War and Ure Museum vase 56.8.8

Downloaded36 from https://www.cambridge.org/core. IP address: 170.106.35.76Animations, on of 27 Ancient Sep 2021 Vase at 11:06:22Scenes ,in subject the Classics to the Cambridge Classroom Core terms of use, available at https://www.cambridge.org/core/terms. https://doi.org/10.1017/S2058631015000057 Torre, D. (2014). ‘Cognitive Animation Theory: A Process-Based Reading of Animation and Human Cognition,’ Animation: An Interdisciplinary Journal, 9.1, pp. 47-64.

Wetterlund, K. (2008). ‘Flipping the Field Trip: Bringing the Art Museum to the Classroom’, Theory into Practice 47.2, pp. 110-117.

Woolland, B. (2008). Pupils as Playwrights: Drama, Literacy and Playwrighting, Stoke-on- Trent: Trentham Books.

1Funded by the AHRC and coordinated by the Ure Museum of Greek Archaeology, University of Reading, in 2011-12 and 2012-13. See http://www. panoply.org.uk/ure-discovery.html and Smith and Nevin (2014) for further details.

2A project funded by the UCD College of Arts and Celtic Studies, 2014-15. A national competition funded by the Classical Association of Ireland Teachers is currently offering under-18s in Ireland the opportunity to determine the plot of a new animation that will be made from the same vase as The Figure 9. | “Camera follows the stone. Amazon woman stands up and throws stone and hit Procession. the man in the head.” A frame from a storyboard for the teenager-planned animation Amazon, created from Ure Museum vase 26.12.11. 3On which see Cox-Petersen (2001) and Wetterlund (2008). Vase animations can be seen with their corresponding vases in the Ure Museum in Reading, explore the website is an effective way to Motion Processing for Static Images’, Berkshire, and in the UCD Classical Museum, expose them to good digital content and Psychological Science, 24.8, pp. 1379-1388. Dublin. The animations have been shown in galleries to model positive internet use. Sharing the without their corresponding vases in the Nyon animations with them also communicates Cox-Petersen, A.M. and Melber, L.M. (2001). Roman Museum, the Leipzig University Museum ‘Using Technology to Prepare and Extend the relevance that Classics still has in the of Antiquities, and The Winnipeg Art Gallery. A Field Trips’, The Clearing House, 75.1, pp.18-20. new animation made for the Kallos Gallery in digital age, where artefacts and classical London will be released later in 2015. There are culture continue to inspire creativity and Fotheringham, L.S. and Brooker, M. (2013). plans to expand into further vase collections in the new uses of technology. ‘Storyboarding and Epic’, in Lovatt, H. and near future. This year will see the release of new Vout, C. (eds.) Epic Visions: Visuality in animations and there are plans to Greek and Latin Epic and its Reception, 4People do not always learn technical skills better by continue expanding into new collections, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, watching animations (rather than diagrams) including vases on the Classical pp. 168-190. depicting of those skills, but when it comes to humanities-based subjects, images (such as vase Civilisation curricula. Try them in the Kim, S., Yoon, M., Whang, S.-M., Tversky, B. scenes) containing implied movement stimulate classroom and find the way to use them & Morrison, J.B. (2007). ‘The effect of mental animation when object and situational that best suits you. animation on comprehension and interest’, knowledge are present. Therefore, once learners have Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 23, pp. been exposed to vase scenes and to vase animations, Dr Sonya Nevin, 260–270. they are more likely to recall details associated with University of Roehampton, movement in images they have seen move (such as the www.panoply.org.uk Nevin, S. (forthcoming Sept. 2015). helmet) and more likely to interpret similar scenes ‘Animating Ancient Warfare: The Spectacle of (i.e. any vase scenes) in terms of movement. For results relating to learning technical skills, see Kim War in the Panoply Vase Animations’, in War et al. (2007). For evidence of improved as Spectacle. Ancient and Modern Perspectives on the comprehension of image and narrative, see Torre Display of Armed Conflict, A. Bakogianni and V. Bibliography (2014) and Coventry et al. (2013). Hope (eds.) Bloomsbury Academic Colón Semenza, G.M. (2008). ‘Teens, Publishing: London. 5See above note. Shakespeare, and the Dumbing Down Cliché: The Case of The Animated Tales’, Shakespeare Smith, A. and Nevin, S. (2014). ‘Using 6Colón Semenza (2008); Woolland (2008). Bulletin 26.2, pp. 37-68. Animation for Successful Engagement, Promotion, and Learning’, in Advancing 7There is superb support for approaching Coventry, K.R., Christophel, T.B., Fehr, T., Engagement: Handbook for Academic Museums, storyboarding with ancient material in Fotheringham Valdés-Conroy, B. and Herrmann, M. (2013). Volume 3, S. Jandl and M. Gold (eds.), and Brooker (2013) pp. 168ff, which includes an ‘Multiple Routes to Mental Animation: MuseumsEtc Ltd: Edinburgh and Boston, pp. analysis of contrasting storyboard representations of Language and Functional Relations Drive 330-359. the Aeneid.