| Paintings and mosaics in Pompeii and Ercolano: |
Painter
|
 Reproduction
of the interior wall decoration discovered in 1771 in one of the
illustrations in Antichità di Ercolano enabled the confident
attribution of detached centre-piece picture. In it we can see
the interior of a room illuminated from beneath by means of an
open doorway leading into a garden containing a pillar crowned
with vase and herma. A woman is shown sitting in its midst on an
elegant bisellium whose turned legs feature herons' heads. She
is painting at a table held by garlanded maidens; the subject is
the same herma as stands before her, representing a bearded
figure, probably Dionysus or Priapus. She is shown dipping her
brush into the box of colours which is lying on a fallen piece
of pillar. Behind the open door, we can see a group of cloaked
women watching the painter carefully.
Since this is a genre painting, and does not portray a real
situation, the group has been added for the completion of the
scene, as in many other cases, including pictures with
mythological subject matter. If so desired, we might speculate
that it is the intention of the spectators to purchase the
picture, inasmuch as the existence of women-painters is
well-known in ancient times, and indeed one of them, Iaia of
Cyzicus, an apprentice portrait-painter who lived around 100
B.C., was also paid more than her contemporary male painters (Pli.Nat.Hist.
XXXV, 147).
Bibliography: PPM IV, p. 75 fig.46
|
Fonte: MANN
All rights reserved
|