Basalt
Basalt is a common extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of basaltic lava exposed at or very near the surface of a planet or moon. Flood basalt describes the formation in a series of basalt flows. By definition, basalt is an igneous rock with generally 45-55% silica and less than 10% feldspathoid by volume. Basalt commonly features a very fine-grained or glassy matrix interspersed with visible mineral grains, the average density is 3.0 gm/cm3. Basalt is defined by its content and texture, and physical descriptions without mineralogical context may be unreliable in some circumstances. Basalt is usually grey to black in colour, but rapidly weathers to brown or rust-red due to oxidation of its mafic minerals into hematite, although usually characterized as dark, basaltic rocks exhibit a wide range of shading due to regional geochemical processes. Due to weathering or high concentrations of plagioclase, some basalts can be quite light-coloured and these phenocrysts usually are of olivine or a calcium-rich plagioclase, which have the highest melting temperatures of the typical minerals that can crystallize from the melt.
Basalt with a texture is called vesicular basalt, when the bulk of the rock is mostly solid. Gabbro is often marketed commercially as black granite and these ultramafic volcanic rocks, with silica contents below 45% are usually classified as komatiites. Agricola applied basalt to the black rock of the Schloßberg at Stolpen. Tholeiitic basalt is relatively rich in silica and poor in sodium, included in this category are most basalts of the ocean floor, most large oceanic islands, and continental flood basalts such as the Columbia River Plateau. Basalt rocks are in some cases classified after their content in High-Ti and Low-Ti varieties. High-Ti and Low-Ti basalts have been distinguished in the Paraná and Etendeka traps and it has greater than 17% alumina and is intermediate in composition between tholeiite and alkali basalt, the relatively alumina-rich composition is based on rocks without phenocrysts of plagioclase. Alkali basalt is relatively poor in silica and rich in sodium and it is silica-undersaturated and may contain feldspathoids, alkali feldspar and phlogopite.
Boninite is a form of basalt that is erupted generally in back-arc basins. Ocean island basalt Lunar basalt On Earth, most basalt magmas have formed by melting of the mantle. Basalt commonly erupts on Io, the third largest moon of Jupiter, and has formed on the Moon, Venus. The crustal portions of oceanic tectonic plates are composed predominantly of basalt, produced from upwelling mantle below, the mineralogy of basalt is characterized by a preponderance of calcic plagioclase feldspar and pyroxene
Muscle cuirass
It first appears in late Archaic Greece and became widespread throughout the 5th and 4th centuries BC. It is commonly depicted in Greek and Roman art, where it is worn by generals, emperors, in Roman sculpture, the muscle cuirass is often highly ornamented with mythological scenes. Archaeological finds of relatively unadorned cuirasses, as well as their depiction by artists in military scenes, the cuirasses were cast in two pieces, the front and the back, hammered. They were a development from the early Archaic bell-shaped cuirass, weighing about 25 pounds, examples from the 5th century BC have been found in the tombs of Thracians, whose cavalrymen wore them. The earliest surviving depiction in Greek sculpture seems to be an example on a sculptural warriors torso found on the acropolis of Athens, the muscle cuirass is depicted on Attic red-figure pottery, which dates from around 530 BC and into the late 3rd century BC. From around 475 to 450 BC, the muscle cuirass is shorter, covering less of the abdomen and it was worn over a chitoniskos.
In neo-Attic art, the cuirass was worn over a longer chiton. Tomb II at Vergina contained an iron muscle cuirass that was decorated with embossed gold, the Italian muscle cuirass lacked the shoulder-guards found on Greek examples. Examples among the Samnites and Oscans sketch a blockier torso more roughly than the anatomically realistic Greek pieces, many examples come from graves in Campania and elsewhere in southern Italy. Polybius omits the muscle cuirass in his description of the types of armor worn by the Roman army, the monument of Aemilius Paulus at Delphi shows two Roman infantrymen wearing mail shirts alongside three who wear muscle cuirasses. They were worn mostly by officers, and may have been molded leather as well as metal, with fringed leather at the armholes, the muscle cuirass is one of the elements that distinguished a senior officers uniform. Kenneth Clark attributes the development of an idealized standard musculature, varied from the facts of nature and he recognized that it allowed for the creation of a sculptural unit in which the position of humps and hollows evokes some memory and yet can be made harmonious by variation and emphasis.
The cuirasse esthétique, which so greatly delighted the artists of the Renaissance, is one of the features of art that have done most to alienate modern taste. We can see from certain replicas that this was originally a construction of great power, such is the copy of the Doryphoros in the Uffizi. Hellenistic rulers added divine emblems such as thunderbolts to the shoulder flaps, another conventional decoration is the gorgoneion, or Medusas head, on the upper chest, and often vegetative motifs on the pectorals. One of the elements of iconography that identify the Greek Athena, other deities, particularly the war gods Ares and Mars, could be portrayed with muscle cuirasses. Among freestanding sculptures portraying Roman emperors, a common type shows the emperor wearing a highly ornamented muscle cuirass, figures such as winged victories, enemies in defeat, and virtues personified represent the emperor as master of the world. Symbolic arrangements this elaborate never appear on Greek cuirasses, the cuirass on the famous Augustus of Prima Porta is particularly ornate
Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa
Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa was a Roman consul, statesman and architect. As a result of these victories Octavian became the first Roman Emperor, Agrippa assisted Augustus in making Rome a city of marble and renovating aqueducts to give all Romans, from every social class, access to the highest quality public services. He was responsible for the creation of many baths and gardens, Agrippa was father-in-law to the second Emperor Tiberius, maternal grandfather to Caligula, and maternal great-grandfather to the Emperor Nero. Agrippa was born between 64–62 BC, in an uncertain location and his father was perhaps called Lucius Vipsanius Agrippa. He had a brother whose name was Lucius Vipsanius Agrippa. The family had not been prominent in Roman public life, Agrippa was about the same age as Octavian, and the two were educated together and became close friends. Despite Agrippas association with the family of Julius Caesar, his brother chose another side in the civil wars of the 40s BC. When Catos forces were defeated, Agrippas brother was taken prisoner and it is not known whether Agrippa fought against his brother in Africa, but he probably served in Caesars campaign of 46–45 BC against Gnaeus Pompeius, which culminated in the Battle of Munda.
Caesar regarded him highly enough to him with Octavius in 45 BC to study in Apollonia with the Macedonian legions. In the fourth month of their stay in Apollonia the news of Julius Caesars assassination in March 44 BC reached them. Agrippa and another friend, Quintus Salvidienus Rufus, advised Octavius to march on Rome with the troops from Macedonia, after his arrival, he learned that Caesar had adopted him as his legal heir. Octavius at this time took Caesars name, but modern historians refer to him as Octavian during this period, after Octavians return to Rome, he and his supporters realised they needed the support of legions. Agrippa helped Octavian to levy troops in Campania, once Octavian had his legions, he made a pact with Mark Antony and Lepidus, legally established in 43 BC as the Second Triumvirate. Octavian and his consular colleague Quintus Pedius arranged for Caesars assassins to be prosecuted in their absence and it may have been in the same year that Agrippa began his political career, holding the position of Tribune of the Plebs, which granted him entry to the Senate.
In 42 BC, Agrippa probably fought alongside Octavian and Antony in the Battle of Philippi, Salvidienus remained Octavians main general at this time. In July 40, while Agrippa was occupied with the Ludi Apollinares that were the praetors responsibility, Agrippa advanced on him, forcing him to withdraw. However, the Triumvirate proved unstable, and in August 40 both Sextus and Antony invaded Italy, Agrippas success in retaking Sipontum from Antony helped bring an end to the conflict. Agrippa was among the intermediaries through whom Antony and Octavian agreed once more upon peace, during the discussions Octavian learned that Salvidienus had offered to betray him to Antony, with the result that Salvidienus was prosecuted and either executed or committed suicide
Liebieghaus
The Liebieghaus is a late 19th-century villa in Frankfurt, Germany. It contains a museum, the Städtische Galerie Liebieghaus, which is part of the Museumsufer on the Sachsenhausen bank of the River Main. Max Hollein has been the director the Städel Museum since January 2006, the Liebieghaus was built in 1896, in a palatial, Historicist style, as a retirement home for the Bohemian textile manufacturer Baron Heinrich von Liebieg. The city of Frankfurt acquired the building in 1908 and devoted it to the sculpture collection, a renovation was completed in October 2009. This included adding a publicly accessible Open Depot, making it possible for the first time to certain parts of the collection that are not in the permanent exhibition. The museum includes ancient Greek and Egyptian sculpture, as well as Medieval, Baroque and Classicist pieces, and works from the Far East. The collection was built up mostly through endowments and international purchases, the building stands on the Schaumainkai, in a garden in which a number of sculptures are on display, including a replica of Danneckers Ariadne on the Panther.
The original, which was acquired by the banker Simon Moritz von Bethmann in 1810, is currently in the depot,2012, From June 20 to September 23,2012, Jeff Koons. The Sculptor 2011/12, From October 27,2011 to March 4,2012, the Medieval Sculptor Museumsufer List of museums in Germany List of art museums Wolf-Christian Setzepfandt, Architekturführer Frankfurt am Main. Vinzenz Brinkmann, Maraike Bückling, Stefan Roller, Meisterwerke im Liebieghaus, home page in English Die neue Antike, una visita alle sale di scultura classica della Liebieghaus di Francoforte Anna Anguissola, LARTTE,30 October 2009
Spear
A spear is a pole weapon consisting of a shaft, usually of wood, with a pointed head. The most common design for hunting or combat spears since ancient times has incorporated a metal spearhead shaped like a triangle, the heads of fishing spears usually feature barbs or serrated edges. The word spear comes from the Old English spere, from the Proto-Germanic speri, from a Proto-Indo-European root *sper- spear, Spears can be divided into two broad categories, those designed for thrusting in melee combat and those designed for throwing. The spear has been used throughout history both as a hunting and fishing tool and as a weapon. Along with the axe and club, it is one of the earliest and most important tools developed by early humans, as a weapon, it may be wielded with either one hand or two. It was used in every conflict up until the modern era, where even it continues on in the form of the bayonet. Spear manufacture and use is not confined to human beings and it is practiced by the western chimpanzee.
Chimpanzees near Kédougou, Senegal have been observed to create spears by breaking straight limbs off trees, stripping them of their bark and side branches and they used the weapons to hunt galagos sleeping in hollows. Orangutans have used spears to fish, presumably after observing humans fishing in a similar manner, neanderthals were constructing stone spear heads from as early as 300,000 BP and by 250,000 years ago, wooden spears were made with fire-hardened points. From 200,000 BP onwards, Middle Paleolithic humans began to make stone blades with flaked edges which were used as spear heads. These stone heads could be fixed to the shaft by gum or resin or by bindings made of animal sinew. During this period, a clear difference remained between spears designed to be thrown and those designed to be used in hand-to-hand combat, by the Magdalenian period, spear-throwers similar to the atlatl were in use. Spears were one of the most common weapons used in the Stone Age. They may be seen as the ancestor of such weapons as the lance, the pilum, the halberd, the naginata, the glaive, the bill.
Spears may be used as both a projectile and melee weapons, Spears used primarily for thrusting may be used with either one or two hands and tend to have heavier and sturdier designs than those intended exclusively for throwing. From the atlatl dart, the arrow for use with bows eventually developed, one-handed spears featuring socketed metal heads were used in conjunction with a shield by the earliest Bronze Age cultures. They were wielded in either combat or in large troop formations. This tradition continued from the first Mesopotamian cultures, through the various ancient Egyptian dynasties, during this time the spear was used by cavalry
Minneapolis Institute of Art
The museum receives support from the Park Board Museum Fund, levied by the Hennepin County commissioners. Additional funding is provided by sponsors and museum members. It is one of the largest art museums in the United States, the Minneapolis Society of Fine Arts was established in 1883 to bring the arts into the life of the community. This group, made up of business and professional leaders, organized art exhibits throughout the decade, in 1889, the Society, now known as the Minneapolis Institute of Art, moved into its first permanent space, inside the newly built Minneapolis Public Library. The institute received gifts from Clinton Morrison and William Hood Dunwoody, among others, a few days the institute received a letter from Dunwoody, who got the ball rolling, Put me down for $100,000. A fundraising dinner a few days brought in $335,500, the new museum, designed by the firm of McKim and White, opened in 1915. The building came to be recognized as one of the finest examples of the Beaux-Arts architectural style in Minnesota.
The art historian Bevis Hillier organized the exhibition Art Deco at the museum, presented from July to September 1971, the building was originally meant to be the first of several sections, but only the front piece built. Several additions have subsequently been built according to plans, including a 1974 addition by Kenzo Tange. An expansion designed by Michael Graves was completed in June 2006, before the latest expansion, just 4 percent of the museums nearly 100,000 objects could be on view at the same time, now that figure is 5 percent. Target Corporation, for which the new wing is named, was the biggest donor, in 2015 the institute rebranded itself, dropping the final s from its name, to become the Minneapolis Institute of Art and encouraging the use of the nickname Mia instead of the acronym MIA. The museum features a collection of approximately 80,000 objects spanning 5,000 years of world history. Its collection includes paintings, prints & drawings, architecture, the Asian collection includes Chinese architecture, jades and ceramics.
The institute owns the Purcell-Cutts House, just east of Lake of the Isles, the house was designed by Purcell & Elmslie and is a masterpiece of Prairie School architecture. It was donated to the museum by Anson B, cutts Jr. the son of its second owner. The house is available for tours on the weekend of each month. In order to encourage private collecting and assist in the acquisition of important works of art, the groups schedule lectures and travel for members. The museum features a series of exhibitions that bring in traveling collections from other museums for display
Ancient Greek sculpture
Ancient Greek sculpture is the sculpture of ancient Greece. Modern scholarship identifies three major stages, frequent subjects were the battles and rulers of the area historically known as Ancient Greece. Smaller works were in a variety of materials, many of them precious. The ores for bronze were easy to obtain. Marble was mostly found around the Parthenon and other major Greek buildings, many copies of the Roman period are marble versions of works originally in bronze. Ordinary limestone was used in the Archaic period, but thereafter, except in areas of modern Italy with no local marble, only for architectural sculpture, plaster or stucco was sometimes used for the hair only. Many statues were given jewellery, as can be seen from the holes for attaching it, by the early 19th century, the systematic excavation of ancient Greek sites had brought forth a plethora of sculptures with traces of notably multicolored surfaces, some of which were still visible. It was not until published findings by German archaeologist Vinzenz Brinkmann in the late 20th and he analyzed the pigments of the original paint to discover their composition.
Brinkmann made several painted replicas of Greek statues that went on tour around the world, museums that hosted the exhibit included the Glyptotek Museum in Munich, the Vatican Museum, and the National Archaeological Museum in Athens, et al. The collection made its American debut at Harvard University in the Fall of 2007 and it is commonly thought that the earliest incarnation of Greek sculpture was in the form of wooden cult statues, first described by Pausanias as xoana. No such statues survive, and the descriptions of them are vague, the first piece of Greek statuary to be reassembled since is probably the Lefkandi Centaur, a terra cotta sculpture found on the island of Euboea, dated c.920 BCE. The statue was constructed in parts, before being dismembered and buried in two separate graves, the centaur has an intentional mark on its knee, which has led researchers to postulate that the statue might portray Cheiron, presumably kneeling wounded from Herakles arrow. If so, it would be the earliest known depiction of myth in the history of Greek sculpture, the forms from the geometrical period were chiefly terra cotta figurines and ivories.
The bronzes are chiefly tripod cauldrons, and freestanding figures or groups, typical works of the era include the Karditsa warrior and the many examples of the equestrian statuette. The repertory of this work is not confined to standing men and horses, however, as vase paintings of the time depict imagery of stags, beetles, hares. There are no inscriptions on early-to-middle geometric sculpture, until the appearance of the Mantiklos Apollo of the early 7th century BCE found in Thebes, the inscription is a declaration of the statuette to Apollo, followed by a request for favors in return. Apart from the novelty of recording its own purpose, this sculpture adapts the formulae of oriental bronzes, as seen in the shorter more triangular face and slightly advancing left leg. This is sometimes seen as anticipating the greater freedom of the 7th century BCE and, as such
Lucius Caesar
Lucius Julius Caesar, most commonly known as Lucius Caesar, was the second son of Marcus Vipsanius Agrippa and Julia the Elder. In the year of his birth, his maternal grandfather Caesar Augustus adopted him and he may have used the cognomen Vipsanianus according to adoption in ancient Rome or Agrippa as his youngest brother Agrippa Postumus after the tria nomina Lucius Julius Caesar. He and his brother were raised and educated by their grandparents, as he and Gaius were the heirs to Augustus, they had promising legal and military careers. Lucius died of an illness on 20 August 2 AD, in Massilia of Gaul, modern day Marseilles, France. His death was followed 18 months by the death of his brother Gaius on 21 February,4 AD and his younger brother Agrippa Postumus was consequently adopted by Augustus along with Tiberius on 27 June,4 AD. It has been suggested there may be been foul play involved in the death of Lucius. Livias presumed motive may have been to orchestrate the accession of her own son Tiberius as heir to Augustus and he was played by Simon MacCorkindale in the 1976 TV series I, Claudius.
Agrippa Postumus Julio-Claudian family tree statue of Lucius Caesar
Kenneth Clark
Clark was born in London, the only child of Kenneth MacKenzie Clark and Margaret Alice McArthur. The Clarks were a wealthy Scottish family with roots in the textile trade and his great-great-grandfather had invented the cotton spool. Kenneth Clark the elder, reputedly the man who broke the bank at Monte Carlo, had retired in 1909 at the age of 41 to become a member of the idle rich. Clark was educated at Wixenford School, Winchester College and Trinity College, Oxford, in 1927 he married a fellow Oxford student, Elizabeth Jane Martin, who was Irish and the daughter of Dr. Emily Winifred Dickson, first female Fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons. The couple had three children, Alan, in 1928, and twins Colette and Colin in 1932, greatly influenced by John Ruskin and a protégé of the most influential art critic of the time, Bernard Berenson, Clark quickly became the British art establishments most respected aesthete. After a stint as fine art curator at Oxfords Ashmolean Museum, in 1933 at age 30 and he remains the youngest person ever to hold the post.
The following year he became Surveyor of the Kings Pictures, as Director of the National Gallery he oversaw the successful relocation and storage of the collection to avoid the Blitz and continued a programme of concerts and performances. In 1939, Clark visited Australia, and referred to it as that intolerable continent, adding that Australian galleries had the worst art, as Director of The National Gallery he wrote Southampton Art Gallerys acquisitions policy which included a growing collection of modern oil paintings. He was an advisor to the Ministry of Information commissioning Dylan Thomas amongst others to write scripts for propaganda films, in 1946 Clark resigned his directorship in order to devote more time to writing. Between 1946 and 1950 he was Slade Professor of Fine Art at Oxford. He was a board member and served as Chairman of the Arts Council of Great Britain from 1955 to 1960. In the preface to his book, The Nude, a study of art, Clark wrote. There is difficulty of form, a survey would be long and repetitive.
And there is a difficulty of scope, since Jacob Burckhardt no responsible art historian would have attempted to cover both antique and post-mediaeval art, in 1955, Clark bought Saltwood Castle in Kent. Kenneth Clark was created Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath in 1938 and he was appointed to the Order of Merit in 1976. In 1959, he received the Grand Decoration with Sash for Services to the Republic of Austria and he was one of the founders, in 1954, of the Independent Television Authority, serving as its Chairman until 1957. In 1969 he wrote and presented Civilisation for BBC television, a series on the history of Western civilisation as seen through its art, afterwards Clark was persuaded to write a book version of Civilisation but lamented that without the visual and musical accompaniment it was weak. Also broadcast in the US on PBS in 1969, Civilisation was successful on both sides of the Atlantic, gaining Clark an international profile, according to Clark, the series was created in answer to growing criticism of Western civilisation, from its value system to its heroes
Contrapposto
Contrapposto is an Italian term that means counterpose. It is used in the arts to describe a human figure standing with most of its weight on one foot so that its shoulders and arms twist off-axis from the hips. This gives the figure a more dynamic, or alternatively relaxed appearance and it can be used to refer to multiple figures which are in counter-pose to one another. It can further encompass the tension as a figure changes from resting on a leg to walking or running upon it. The leg that carries the weight of the body is known as the engaged leg, contrapposto is less emphasized than the more sinuous S Curve, and creates the illusion of past and future movement. Contrapposto was an important sculptural development, for its appearance marks the first time in Western art that the human body is used to express a psychological disposition. The balanced, harmonious pose of the Kritios Boy suggests a calm and relaxed state of mind, the first known statue to use contrapposto is Kritios Boy, c.480 BC, so called because it was once attributed to the sculptor Kritios.
It is possible, even likely, that earlier bronze statues had used the technique, the statue is a Greek marble original and not a Roman copy. Prior to the introduction of contrapposto, the statues that dominated ancient Greece were the archaic kouros, contrapposto has been used since the dawn of classical western sculpture. The Polykletian statues – for example and Doryphoros – are idealized athletic young men with the divine sense, in these works, the pelvis is no longer axial with the vertical statue as in the archaic style of earlier Greek sculpture before Kritios Boy. Contrapposto can be seen in the Roman copies of the statues of Hermes and Heracles. A famous example is the statue of Hermes with the infant Dionysus in Olympia by Praxiteles. It can be seen in the Roman copies of Polyclitus amazon, Greek Art emphasized humanism along with the human mind and the human body’s beauty. Greek youths trained and competed in contests in the nude. A great contribution to the pose was the concept of a canon of proportions.
Classical contrapposto was revived in the Renaissance by the Italian artists Donatello and Leonardo da Vinci, followed by Michelangelo, one of the major achievements of the Italian Renaissance was the re-discovery of contrapposto, although in Mannerism it became greatly over-used. The technique continues to be employed in sculpture
Bronze
These additions produce a range of alloys that may be harder than copper alone, or have other useful properties, such as stiffness, ductility, or machinability. The archeological period where bronze was the hardest metal in use is known as the Bronze Age. In the ancient Near East this began with the rise of Sumer in the 4th millennium BC, with India and China starting to use bronze around the same time, everywhere it gradually spread across regions. The Bronze Age was followed by the Iron Age starting from about 1300 BC and reaching most of Eurasia by about 500 BC, the discovery of bronze enabled people to create metal objects which were harder and more durable than previously possible. Bronze tools, weapons and building such as decorative tiles were harder and more durable than their stone. It was only that tin was used, becoming the major ingredient of bronze in the late 3rd millennium BC. Tin bronze was superior to arsenic bronze in that the process could be more easily controlled. Also, unlike arsenic, metallic tin and fumes from tin refining are not toxic, the earliest tin-alloy bronze dates to 4500 BCE in a Vinča culture site in Pločnik.
Other early examples date to the late 4th millennium BC in Africa and some ancient sites in China, ores of copper and the far rarer tin are not often found together, so serious bronze work has always involved trade. Tin sources and trade in ancient times had a influence on the development of cultures. In Europe, a source of tin was the British deposits of ore in Cornwall. In many parts of the world, large hoards of bronze artefacts are found, suggesting that bronze represented a store of value, in Europe, large hoards of bronze tools, typically socketed axes, are found, which mostly show no signs of wear. With Chinese ritual bronzes, which are documented in the inscriptions they carry and from other sources and these were made in enormous quantities for elite burials, and used by the living for ritual offerings. Pure iron is soft, and the process of beating and folding sponge iron to wrought iron removes from the metal carbon. Careful control of the alloying and tempering eventually allowed for wrought iron with properties comparable to modern steel, Bronze was still used during the Iron Age, and has continued in use for many purposes to the modern day.
Among other advantages, it does not rust, the weaker wrought iron was found to be sufficiently strong for many uses. Archaeologists suspect that a disruption of the tin trade precipitated the transition. The population migrations around 1200–1100 BC reduced the shipping of tin around the Mediterranean, limiting supplies, there are many different bronze alloys, but typically modern bronze is 88% copper and 12% tin
Polykleitos, Doryphoros, Smarthistory[9]