For Yous Data - 'Animal-Shaped Vessels From The Ancient World: Feasting Amongst Gods, Heroes, As Well As Kings' At The Harvard Fine Art Museums, Cambridge, Ma

Animal-Shaped Vessels from the Ancient World: Feasting with Gods, Heroes, together with Kings brings together nearly lx elaborate vessels of beast shape from collections inward the U.S. together with Europe. While the songs, speeches, together with prayers that enlivened ancient feasts are directly largely lost to us, these vessels accept survived, offering a glimpse into the rich symbolism together with communal practices that works life human face at these gatherings. Taking animal-shaped vessels equally performative props inward the multifaceted footing of feasting, the exhibition non exclusively introduces the social together with ceremonial functions of these ritual occasions, but besides highlights the essential together with universal role played yesteryear nutrient together with drink—and yesteryear the highly imaginative containers used to relish these refreshments.

Vessel inward the shape of a hump-backed bull, 1350–1000 BCE, Iran 
[Credit: © Ashmolean Museum of Art together with Archaeology]

The exhibition includes vessels inward the shape of standing or reclining animals, animal-headed cups together with beakers, drinking horns, together with animated pitchers. Various creatures, existent together with imagined, give these objects their shapes: powerful bulls together with rams, violet lions together with mythical griffins, wild boars together with goats, deer together with gazelles, graceful birds, together with braying donkeys, alongside others.

Assembling such a arrive at of vessels for the showtime time, the exhibition presents a cross-cultural together with cross-disciplinary exam of how they spanned geography together with time, across iii continents together with over iii millennia. The international menagerie of drinking together with pouring vessels vividly illustrates non but how shapes together with artistic forms crossed borders, but how ideas equally good were exchanged alongside cultures—tangible bear witness of closed contact together with the intermingling of traditions.

Beaker with the front end of a crested together with winged lion, Iran, sixth century BCE
[Credit: © The Metropolitan Museum of Art]

Silver Rhyton with the front end of a ram, Achaemenid period, Early to mid fifth century BCE
[Credit: © The Metropolitan Museum of Art]

Stag-Shaped Drinking Horn (1st century BC–1st century AD), Parthian
[Credit: Getty’s Open Content Program]

Beyond their role inward ritual together with ceremonial drinking, animal-shaped vessels functioned variously equally diplomatic gifts together with tribute, the spoils of war, offerings to deities together with the dead, together with exotic objects of trade; they besides were prized together with emulated equally symbols of condition together with prestige.

Each object inward the exhibition is a compelling beast report inward itself, with a wealth of information embedded inward its material, shape, together with decoration. Many were made of rare or innovative materials—including gold, silver, bronze, glass, faience, together with horn—and at the hands of skilled artists. They conveyed of import information virtually their liquid contents together with the nature of a gathering, but were besides markers of social stature, identity, etiquette, together with shared values.

Donkey caput kantharos depicting Dionysos together with his entourage, Greek Archaic period,
520-500 BCE [Credit: © British Museum]

Eagle caput mug. Attributed to Douris, Greek, Attic, 490–470 BCE. Terracotta, 
red-figure technique. From Capua (Italy) [Credit: © British Museum]

Deer caput rhyton (c. 350 BC), Republic of Bulgaria [Credit: © National Archaeological Institute
with Museum at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Sofia]

Footed rhyton with horned head, Roman Imperial period, 1st-2nd century CE
[Credit: © British Museum]

Most of the objects inward the exhibition belong to a tradition of animal-shaped drinking together with pouring vessels that persisted inward the Near East together with the Mediterranean from the Bronze Age inward the 3rd together with 2d millennia BCE to the advent of Islam inward the 7th century; this tradition eventually extended all the means to China, via the Silk Road.

Select animal-shaped vessels from other cultures together with periods—including East Asia, Africa, Europe, together with South America—provide farther points of comparison. In add-on to the vessels, the exhibition features several related objects (paintings together with sculpture) with ancient together with modern representations of feasts.

Octagonal loving cup with the front end of a lion, Chinese, Sui or Tang dynasty, 7th century CE. Porcelain
[Credit: © British Museum]

Double-vessel monkey (14th-15th century), Chimú, Peru 
[Credit: Harvard Art Museums]

More than xx domestic together with international institutions accept generously lent objects to the exhibition, including the Ashmolean Museum (Oxford University), the British Museum (London), the Louvre (Paris), the Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York), together with the Museum of Fine Arts (Boston).

The exhibition, curated yesteryear Susanne Ebbinghaus, the George M.A. Hanfmann Curator of Ancient Art together with caput of the Division of Asian together with Mediterranean Art at the Harvard Art Museums, is accompanied yesteryear a amount catalogue edited yesteryear Ebbinghaus.

Crucial back upwards for the Animal-Shaped Vessels projection has been made possible inward portion yesteryear a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities: Exploring the Human Endeavor. In addition, the Harvard Art Museums are deeply grateful to the anonymous donor of a gift inward retention of Melvin R. Seiden together with to Malcolm H. Wiener (Harvard A.B. ’57, J.D. ’63) together with Michael together with Helen Lehmann for enabling us to mountain this exhibition together with to pursue the related research.

This piece of occupation was besides made possible inward portion yesteryear the next endowed funds: the David M. Robinson Fund; the Andrew W. Mellon Publication Funds, including the Henry P. McIlhenny Fund; together with the M. Victor Leventritt Fund, which brings outstanding scholars of the history together with theory of fine art to the Harvard together with Greater Boston communities through the generosity of the wife, children, together with friends of the belatedly M. Victor Leventritt, Harvard Class of 1935.

The exhibition, Animal-Shaped Vessels from the Ancient World: Feasting with Gods, Heroes, together with Kings, volition live on sentiment September 7, 2018–January 6, 2019.

Source: Harvard Art Museums [August 20, 2018]
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