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

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Obverse, Gigantomachy (battle of gods and giants) Reverse, Dionysos with satyrs and maenads During the latter part of the sixth century B.C., black-figure artists mastered their medium sufficiently to create compositions with many figures in action and in complex spatial relationships. Battle scenes were ideal subjects. The presence of Athena identifies the combatants here. The arms and armor are those that contemporary Greek soldiers would have used. Dionysos and his followers on the reverse could, potentially, create similar din and confusion. Here, they appear sprightly but orderly.

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