Art History

Mediterranean art and architecture date back to the Minoan culture of the third millennium BCE. Color was regarded as an inherent feature in the ancient Mediterranean art world; therefore, form and color were inextricably linked. Color was a phenomenon feature that influenced the artist's experience of the built and natural environment. Additionally, Mediterranean architecture saw the induction of durable, attractive, and elaborate structures. With color as the inherent feature of art and durability as the feature of architecture, Mediterranean art and architecture created structured perceptions, and formed the experience of what the built and natural environment of the period emulated. Therefore, this essay reviews the indirect lost-wax process, the Neolithic Stonehenge, Venus of Willendorf, horse painting in Lascaux Cave, and Rock painting at Tassili n' Aijer, Algeria, as ancient artworks/monuments that defined the Ancient Mediterranean art and architecture.

The indirect lost-wax process (4500–3500 BC) was commonly used to create ancient Mediterranean metal artifacts. The artist would start with a metal facsimile of an object (Ann). The object was either an existing object to be duplicated as a step from the conceptual image of the thing to its metal instantiation, or a new object to be created. Secondly, the Neolithic Stonehenge is one of the iconic monuments built in the ancient Mediterranean, which took Neolithic builders 1,500 years to build. Built around 2500 BC in southern England, the structure was made up of roughly 100 huge upright stones arranged in a circular arrangement. The building inner ring's bluestones have been traced some 200 miles away in Wales, while the outer ring's sandstone slabs come from nearby quarries. This was a clear indication that durability was the definitive factor of ancient Mediterranean architecture.

Thirdly, Venus of Willendorf, created in 23,000 B.C.E., is a faceless woman with plaited hair or some form of headgear carved out of limestone. This relic, which dates from around 25,000 years old, was discovered in Austria in 1908, showing how much color impacted the creation of these artifacts (Rampley). Fourth among the artifacts of the ancient Mediterranean is the horse painting in Lascaux Cave, which dates back to 15,000 B.C.E., and depicts an animal that was common and native to the region. Lastly, the Rock painting at Tassili n' Aijer, Algeria from 8000 BC. The painting entailed different species of animals and color was utilized to show humans and animals in remarkable naturalism.

The ancient Mediterranean was a defining period for art and architecture. The indirect lost-wax process gave rise to the duplication of metal sculptures. Additionally, Neolithic Stonehenge proved that their architectural skills were elaborate and durable since they stand to date. Paintings such as the ones in Lascaux Cave show that man’s relationship with animals is instinctive.

Work Cited

Ann C. Gunter. A Companion to Ancient Near Eastern Art; John Wiley & Sons, (2018). Literary Criticism.

Rampley, M. The Vienna School of Art History. Empire and the Politics of Scholarship, 1847–1918. University Park, (2013): The Pennsylvania State University Press.