Fragment of a marble relief with a Nike

Fragment of a marble relief with a Nike

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

This figure must represent a Nike (the personification of victory) for a few feathers of her right wing are visible carved in low relief on the background. The wind-blown drapery that clings to her body and the ridgelike folds that form beautiful curved patterns are typical of the elegant mannered art of the late fifth and early fourth centuries B.C. Although this twisting figure brings to mind those on the reliefs that decorated the Nike Parapet at the entrance to the Athenian Akropolis, it must have been part of a metope or relief from a building or other temple constructed at approximately the same period.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Fragment of a marble relief with a NikeFragment of a marble relief with a NikeFragment of a marble relief with a NikeFragment of a marble relief with a NikeFragment of a marble relief with a Nike

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.