Terracotta statuette of a woman

Terracotta statuette of a woman

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The use of molds and the plastic medium of terracotta allowed Greek sculptors to explore variations on a theme with relative ease. Varying treatments of the head and drapery produce different effects in these two statuettes, each depicting an elegant standing woman draped in a himation (cloak) and holding a fan.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than thirty thousand works ranging in date from the Neolithic period (ca. 4500 B.C.) to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312. It includes the art of many cultures and is among the most comprehensive in North America. The geographic regions represented are Greece and Italy, but not as delimited by modern political frontiers: Greek colonies were established around the Mediterranean basin and on the shores of the Black Sea, and Cyprus became increasingly Hellenized. For Roman art, the geographical limits coincide with the expansion of the Roman Empire. The department also exhibits the art of prehistoric Greece (Helladic, Cycladic, and Minoan) and pre-Roman art of Italic peoples, notably the Etruscans.