Terracotta lekythos (oil flask)

Vouni Painter

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Woman and youth at two graves This lekythos is impressive for the well-preserved color and quantity of detail. The setting is probably a family burial plot. Closest to the viewer are two dark blocks, the left one partly overlapping the right. Attached to the right block are a pair of jumping weights, an aryballos (oil flask), and a wreath. The two stelai (grave markers) should certainly be understood as standing on top of the blocks. Farthest from the viewer are two forms that represent one or two burial mounds. The figures at this funerary precinct are adding to the large number of fillets (bands) and wreaths.

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