Yes, it's true: many of the works of art from the classical world were exceptionally tacky, at least in terms of color. Not that this should be surprising, to people who have read the part of the Republic where Socrates compares democracy to a garishly painted statue.
The same thing, as it happens, is also true of a lot of medieval art and architecture.
"Thou shalt not extinguish thine anger, but shall master it,
that thy conscience may not be blunted by adjustment
to wrong causes."
-The Dutch Ten Commandments to Foil the Nazis
2 comments:
Are we sure this is tacky? (and not just unexpected or surprising?) They sort of remind me of painted Easter eggs, which I think are lovely.
Two questions: 1. who is the 'we'? and 2. what does it mean to be 'tacky'?
The 'we' I am assuming in this case to be the development of aesthetic judgments about art in the West, where 'the classical' implies clean lines, geometric forms, verisimilitude (and, not incidentally, whiteness); this is what Michelangelo is supposed to be 'going back' to; this is why forms of art denoted as 'classical' tend towards simpler colors and simpler lines (Poussin, maybe; certainly Delacroix). Perhaps that's a false impression to draw, but the tradition of western art is in part build on that impression.
Re tackiness: De gustibus and all that.
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