Collection Online as of March 27, 2023

White-Ground Lekythos (Oil Vessel): Youths at Tomb

c. 420 BC

attributed to Group R

(Greek, Attic, active c. 420–410 BC)

Greek, Attic

Ceramic

Overall: 49.5 cm (19 1/2 in.)

Gift of the John Huntington Art and Polytechnic Trust 1928.859

Location

102B Greek

Fun Fact

White-ground vases give some idea of the appearance of ancient wall painting.

Description

This white-ground lekythos, a large funerary oil vessel, shows three youths at a tomb. The one seated in the center likely represents the deceased, while those standing on either side are mourners. Although much of the pigment is now lost, the strong use of line and three-quarter views have been cited by some scholars as possibly reflecting the lost works of the famous wall-painter Parrhasios.

Provenance

?-1928

Dr. Jacob Hirsch, New York, NY, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art

1928-

The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH

Citations

Beazley Archive. n.d. Beazley Archive Pottery Database. Oxford: Beazley Archive. BAPD 217811 www.beazley.ox.ac.uk

Beazley, J. D. Attic White Lekythoi. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1938. p. 25, pl. VIII (as "Once Geneva, Dr. Hirsch").

Cox, Warren E. The Book of Pottery and Porcelain. New York: L. Lee and Shepard Co.; distributed by Crown Publishers, 1944. Vol. I, p. 59, pl. 15.

Archaeological Institute of America. 1953. "Art and Archaeology at the Cleveland Museum of Art," Archaeology: A Magazine Dealing with the Antiquity of the World, vol. 6.4. pp. 195-202 (ill. on p. 198).

Carter, Martha L. Classical Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1961. Mentioned and reproduced: p. 5-6; Plate 10 archive.org

Beazley, J. D. Attic Red-Figure Vase-Painters, 2nd ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963. p. 1383, no. 10.

Boulter, C. G., Jenifer Neils, and Gisela Walberg. Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1971. p. 23, plates 35,2 & 36

Neils, Jenifer. "The Orestes Sarcophagus and Other Classical Marbles." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 71, no. 4 (1984). p. 103, fig. 4 www.jstor.org

Carpenter, Thomas H., J. D. Beazley, Thomas Mannack, Melanie Mendonça, and Lucilla Burn. Beazley Addenda: Additional References to ABV, ARV² & Paralipomena. Oxford: Published for the British Academy by Oxford University Press, 1989. p. 372

Beazley, J. D., and Donna C. Kurtz. Greek Vases: Lectures. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1989. plate 24

Moon, Warren G. and Louise Berge. Greek Vase-Painting in Midwestern Collections. Chicago: The Art Institute of Chicago, 1979. Mentioned & reproduced pp. 218-219

Exhibition history

Greek Vase-Painting in Midwestern Collections. The Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago, IL (December 22, 1979-February 24, 1980).