MASTERS, PUPILS AND MULTIPLE IMAGES IN GREEK RED-FIGURE VASE PAINTING DISSERTATION Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of the Ohio State University By Sue Allen Hoyt, B.A., M.A. ***** The Ohio State University 2006 Dissertation Committee: Approved by Professor Mark D. Fullerton, Adviser Professor Timothy J. McNiven __________________________ Adviser Professor Howard Crane History of Art Graduate Program Text copyright by Sue Allen Hoyt 2006 ABSTRACT Little is known about Athenian vase-painting workshops of the 6th through 4th centuries BC. Almost no references exist in ancient literature, and there are few archaeological remains besides the vases themselves. I examined the technical details of vase-painting “copies”–images of uncommon scenes on vases by painted different painters– and compared the steps in the painting process, (especially the preliminary sketches), to see if these could supply any information about workshop practices. The research revealed that there are differences in sketches executed by different painters, and that there were often obvious differences in the care exercised in the different steps of the painting process. When the different steps consistently exhibit different levels of skill in execution, this suggests that workshops were organized so that workers with few skills performed the tasks that demanded the least; more-skilled workers painted the less-important borders etc., and the most-advanced painted the figures. On a few vases the sketch lines were more skillfully executed than the paintings that overlay them. Further, in the case of the Marsyas Painter and the Painter of Athens 1472, more than one pair of vases with replicated rare scenes ii exists. This suggests that there may have been a “Master” in the workshop who not only painted vases himself, but drew sketches for other less-skilled workers, perhaps apprentices or pupils, to paint. If the sketches on different vases were all drawn by one draftsman but the paintings were executed by different painters, certainly they must have worked together. This system would explain the relationship between the many pairs of shared images in the work of the Marsyas Painter and the Painter of Athens 1472, and others who also produced duplicated pictures. The study concludes with a short list of duplicated images as suggestions for further research. iii Dedicated to the memory of Randi and Glenn Mullins iv ACKNOWLEDGMENTS In the course of formulating and writing this dissertation I incurred debts to many people. First, to my advisors Prof. Mark Fullerton and Prof. Timothy McNiven, whose help, patience and encouragement have been unstinting throughout. Prof. Howard Crane, Prof. Barbara Haeger, Prof. Francis Richardson, Prof. Sarah Johnston and Dr. Thomas H. Carpenter of Ohio University, have all provided additional inspiration and example. This dissertation would have been impossible without Librarian extra- ordinaire Susan Wyngaard and the staff of the Fine Arts Library at Ohio State. To her, to Assistant Librarian Maria von Boekel, to Gretchen Donelson, Who Knows All, and to the many student helpers who cheerfully hauled elephant folios, my sincerest thanks. Thanks are also due to, the staff of the Blegen Library at the University of Cincinnati, the Library of the Toledo Museum of Art, the Sackler Library of the Ashmolean Museum, and the genius who invented Ohiolink. Many sincere thanks to the museums who have graciously allowed me access to their collections: to Dr. Sandra Knudsen, Associate Curator of Ancient Art at the Toledo Museum of Art, whose help and willingness to let me examine the Peleus and Thetis pelike so many times is greatly appreciated; to Dr. Dyfri v Williams and his staff at the British Museum; Dr. Carolyn Leder at the Harrow School Museum, and Brenda Breed of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts for research visits that were pleasurable as well as instructive. Thanks to Dr. Donna Kurtz, Curator of the Beazley Archive at the Ashmolean Museum, and her staff who welcomed me in the midst of finishing the CVA Online. The Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Trustees of the British Museum, the Hermitage State Museum, and the Toledo Museum of Art gave permission to publish the vases in their collections. Special thanks to Dr. Ian McPhee, for his list of the Painter of Athens 1472’s vase not known to Beazley, to Dr. Robert Sutton for his article on nude bathers, and to Dr. Jasper Gaunt for information about the pelike with Poseidon and Amymone. I am grateful to the Department of the History of Art at Ohio State for awarding me Pyne-Murnane Travel Grants, to OSU Marion for a Faculty Enrichment Grant, and the Graduate Student Association at OSU. These grants made my research in Athens, Boston and London possible. An Arthur Meier Schlesinger, Jr. Grant from the Graduate School at Ohio State helped me finish this work. Thanks to my friends and colleagues: Dr. Wendy Schaller, whose own work was an inspiration; to Dr. Doot Bokelman and Dr. Dawn Cunningham, who have read so many drafts so willingly, and to Dr. Craig Hardiman, whose Aptiva saved me after the Blue Screen of Death struck. vi I owe a special debt to the late, sorely missed, Kurt Luckner, former Curator of ancient art at the Toledo Museum of Art, who first introduced me to the Peleus and Thetis vase, and to Drs. D. Bradley Welling, M.D. and Seth M. Kantor, M.D. Without them, this dissertation would have been impossible. Special thanks to the friends who always knew I could do it: Hal and Phyllis Duryée, Shirley Engleman, Charles Kleibacker, Emil McVeigh, and Tom Minnick. And for the cats who’ve slept on the manuscript since its inception: catnip. Finally, to my very dear friends Ruth and Bill Lantz, to Greg Blum, Tim, Sally, Keri and Mark: this one’s for you! vii VITA July 15................................. Born, Mount Vernon. Ohio 1966 ................................... B.A. English, Case Western Reserve University 1971 ................................... M.A. Ceramics, The Ohio State University 1994-2003 ........................... Graduate Teaching and Research Associate, The Ohio State University 2003-2005 ........................... Adjunct Lecturer, The Ohio State University, Marion and Newark Campuses 2006 ................................... Slide Librarian, Department of Art, Ohio Wesleyan University, Delaware PUBLICATIONS Research Publications Sue Allen Hoyt, “Studio Copies in Athenian Vase-Painting.” Proceedings of the XVIth International Congress of Classical Archaeology, Boston 2003. Ed. Carol Mattusch and Alice Donahue. Oxford: Oxbow Books, 2005. FIELDS OF STUDY History of Art, major field: Ancient Greek and Roman Art viii TABLE OF CONTENTS Page Abstract ......................................................................................................ii Dedication ..................................................................................................iv Acknowledgments ........................................................................................v Vita ..........................................................................................................viii List of Figures .............................................................................................xi List of Abbreviations....................................................................................xvi Chapters: 1. Introduction: Historiography of Vase-Painting Research and Methodology.....1 Vase-Painting Scholarship Before 1900 .................................................1 19th - Century Attribution Studies .........................................................4 J. D. Beazley’s Methodology..................................................................6 A Short History of Connoisseurship before Beazley ...............................10 Beazley’s Use of Connoisseurship ........................................................11 Criticisms of Beazley’s Method ............................................................16 Confirmation of Connoisseurship as a Methodology ..............................17 2. Multiple Images in Greek Art ...................................................................47 Typology of Multiple Images ..............................................................49 Single-Painter Duplicates .........................................................49 Repeated Compositions ...........................................................50 Repeated Gestures ..................................................................52 Generic Images .......................................................................52 ix 2. Sources of Multiple Images .............................................................. 54 Criteria for Multiple Images .............................................................. 58 Nomenclature for Multiple Images .....................................................59 Replicas..................................................................................59 Translations ...........................................................................60 Variants .................................................................................62 Repetition Within a Flexible Canon .....................................................64 Some Purposes of Multiple Images ....................................................66 3. Vase-Painting Technique, Multiple Images and Workshop Practices ...........80 Red-Figure Vase-Painting Technique ..................................................80