ANCIENT TERRACOTTAS from SOUTH ITALY and SICILY in the J
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
ANCIENT TERRACOTTAS FROM SOUTH ITALY AND SICILY in the j. paul getty museum The free, online edition of this catalogue, available at http://www.getty.edu/publications/terracottas, includes zoomable high-resolution photography and a select number of 360° rotations; the ability to filter the catalogue by location, typology, and date; and an interactive map drawn from the Ancient World Mapping Center and linked to the Getty’s Thesaurus of Geographic Names and Pleiades. Also available are free PDF, EPUB, and MOBI downloads of the book; CSV and JSON downloads of the object data from the catalogue and the accompanying Guide to the Collection; and JPG and PPT downloads of the main catalogue images. © 2016 J. Paul Getty Trust This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ or send a letter to Creative Commons, PO Box 1866, Mountain View, CA 94042. First edition, 2016 Last updated, February 24, 2016 https://www.github.com/gettypubs/terracottas Published by the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles Getty Publications 1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 500 Los Angeles, California 90049-1682 www.getty.edu/publications Ruth Evans Lane, Benedicte Gilman, and Marina Belozerskaya, Project Editors Robin H. Ray and Mary Christian, Copy Editors Antony Shugaar, Translator Elizabeth Chapin Kahn, Production Stephanie Grimes, Digital Researcher Eric Gardner, Designer & Developer Greg Albers, Project Manager Distributed in the United States and Canada by the University of Chicago Press Distributed outside the United States and Canada by Yale University Press, London Printed in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: J. Paul Getty Museum, author, issuing body. | Ferruzza, Maria Lucia, editor. Title: Ancient terracottas from South Italy and Sicily in the J. Paul Getty Museum / Maria Lucia Ferruzza. Description: Los Angeles : J. Paul Getty Museum, [2016] | ©2016 | Includes bibliographical references. Identifiers: LCCN 2015042795 (print) | LCCN 2015048344 (ebook) | ISBN 9781606064863 (pbk.) | ISBN 9781606064856 (epub) | ISBN 9781606061237 (online) Subjects: LCSH: Terra-cotta sculpture, Ancient—Italy, Southern—Catalogs. | Terra-cotta sculpture, Ancient—Italy—Sicily—Catalogs. | J. Paul Getty Museum—Catalogs. | Terra-cotta sculpture—California—Los Angeles—Catalogs. Classification: LCC NB145 .J27 2016 (print) | LCC NB145 (ebook) | DDC 733/.309377–dc23 LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015042795 Front cover: Thymiaterion Supported by a Statuette of Nike (detail, cat. 53) Back cover: Group of a Seated Poet (Orpheus?) and Sirens (cats. 1–3) pp. ii–iii: Fragment of a Head (detail, cat. 22) p. vii: Statuette of a Mime (detail, cat. 29) pp. 6–7: Head of a Woman (detail, cat. 51) p. 214: Head and Torso of a Youth with Tarentine mold (detail, fig. 12) Contents Director’s Foreword . vi TIMOTHY POTTS Acknowledgments . vii Introduction . 1 Classification . 2 Production Techniques. 3 Map of South Italy and Sicily. 5 Catalogue . 6 Taranto Region (Cats. 1–37). 8 Canosa (Cats. 38–46) . 122 Medma (Cats. 47–48) . 148 Other South Italy (Cats. 49–50) . 160 Sicily (Cats. 51–60) . 168 Guide to the Collection of South Italian and Sicilian Terracottas . 214 CLAIRE L. LYONS Abbreviations . 223 Bibliography . 224 Authors . 232 Index . 233 Director’s Foreword Timothy Potts The tradition of making sculpture in terracotta represents larger collection of over a thousand terracottas described by one of the signal artistic accomplishments of ancient Italian Claire Lyons in an accompanying guide. cultures before and during the rise of Rome as the Among our holdings perhaps the most remarkable of dominant regional power. From Pliny the Elder we learn all is the life-size funerary group of a seated poet as that in the seventh century bc, an exiled Corinthian Orpheus and two sirens captured in a moment of song merchant, Demaratus, introduced the fashioning of figures (cats. 1, 2, and 3). This is surely one of the most spectacular from baked earth, an art that was “brought to perfection by achievements of the ancient coroplast’s art from anywhere Italy and especially by Etruria” (Naturalis Historia 35.45, in the Mediterranean. Much interest attaches also to the 157). The first recorded artist names on the peninsula in fact smaller figurines that represent miniature versions of belong to sculptors who worked in clay, Vulca of Veii and celebrated sculptures, such as the Apollo playing a kithara Gorgasus and Damophilus of Magna Graecia, who produced (cat. 44), which echoes the Apollo Kitharoidos carved by decorations for temples in Rome around the turn of the Timarchides in the second century bc. A unique pair of sixth to fifth centuries bc. As several examples in the Getty altars with expressively modeled reliefs of the Adonis myth collection show, Tarentine masters were not far behind, (cats. 47 and 48) depict aspects of cult worship and faith in signing their works by inscribing their names into the damp the afterlife that held particular sway among the residents clay matrix. Identified in later Greek literature as of Magna Graecia. coroplasts—literally, “modelers of girls”—these artisans Following an introduction to the collection, the crafted figurines of great variety and expressiveness that are catalogue entries situate each object within its wider among these cultures’ most distinctive art forms. typological and iconographical milieu, citing connections to Mass produced and finished by hand, terracottas were centers of production in Puglia, Lucania, Calabria, Sicily, ubiquitous in the ancient Mediterranean. Usually modest in and the Greek mainland. Technical analyses conducted by scale, statuettes circulated widely over long periods and the Getty’s Antiquities Conservation Department have through multiple generations of molds, providing critical revealed details of manufacturing techniques and the evidence for regional styles, patterns of trade, and local application of a palette of polychrome pigments and gilding. cults. Commonly found in dwellings, graves, and Ancient Terracottas from South Italy and Sicily is the sanctuaries, terracottas gave tangible form both to private second in a series of web-based scholarly catalogues of the spiritual beliefs and to public religious observances. collection of Greek, Roman, and Etruscan art at the Getty This catalogue features a selection of the most Villa. By presenting this important material in an online important works attributed to coroplastic workshops in format, our aim is to launch a new platform to share the southern Italy and Sicily from the collection of the J. Paul latest research and to encourage readers to explore related Getty Museum. The sixty terracottas investigated by Maria groups of terracottas in the museum. We are grateful to the Lucia Ferruzza span the Archaic, Classical, and Hellenistic author, all the contributors, and the Publications staff for periods from about 550 to 100 bc. Comprising large-scale realizing this innovative and accessible guide to the sculptures and statuettes, as well as votive heads, altars, collection. decorative appliqués, and masks, they number among a vi Acknowledgments I extend my sincere and affectionate gratitude to the staff of Belozerskaya, Ruth Evans Lane, Elizabeth Kahn, Greg the J. Paul Getty Museum, particularly to Claire Lyons, Albers, Eric Gardner, Stephanie Grimes, Rachel Barth, and curator of Antiquities, and Karol Wight, former senior other staff at Getty Publications who made this catalogue a curator of Antiquities, who supported and encouraged me reality. through the many stages of this project, assuring an ongoing I am especially grateful to Clemente Marconi, first dialogue that has enriched me and this project enormously. editor of the manuscript, and Caterina Greco for their A grateful acknowledgment goes to Marion True, former continuing intellectual generosity and enlightening curator of Antiquities, who initially entrusted this project to conversations. me in the conviction that it would be a significant addition Heartfelt thanks are owed to all the colleagues who to scholarly knowledge of the Getty collections. offered suggestions to improve and enrich the work, though I would also like to thank current and former responsibility for any errors or omissions rests with me colleagues in the Department of Antiquities—Mary Louise alone. In particular, it was a privilege to have the superb Hart, Kenneth Lapatin, Janet Burnett Grossman, John guidance of Pietro Giovanni Guzzo, Paola Pelagatti, and Papadopoulos, and Alexandra Sofroniew—whose Salvatore Settis, who found the time and patience to read professionalism and collaboration made my task a privilege and review parts of this book. I had stimulating and and a pleasure. Special thanks are due to Jerry Podany, invaluable conversations with Gianfranco Adornato, Nunzio former senior conservator of Antiquities, Jeffrey Maish, Allegro, Nicola Bonacasa, Paolo Carafa, Rosa Maria Cucco, Susan Lansing Maish, Erik Risser, Marie Svoboda in the Maria Antonietta Dell’Aglio, Daniel Graepler, Maria Department of Antiquities Conservation, and to David Costanza Lentini, Enzo Lippolis, Paolo Moreno, Giampaolo Scott, for their observations on and contributions to the Nadalini, Erik Østby, Nicoletta Poli, Valeria Tardo, Stefano scientific analysis of several terracottas. Stimulating Vassallo, and Carla Aleo Nero. discussions of technical problems made me more confident My