Terracotta bell-krater (bowl for mixing wine and water)

Polygnotos

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Obverse, kitharode and three male listeners Reverse, three youths The principal scene shows a young man performing for three listeners. The instrument is a kithara, the type of lyre used for formal presentation. The artist's concern is to convey the response of each figure, from the deep introversion of the seated man to the gesture of the person behind him. This representation is characteristically classical in its emphasis on a state of being rather than on a narrative event.

Greek and Roman Art

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

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.

Metropolitan Museum of Art