Lot Essay
The obverse with the profile of a horse, amazon and griffin to the right, the reverse with two mantled youths in conversation, one holding a diskos, with a full rosette between them. For a similar scene by the Amazon Painter, see J.D. Beazley, Attic Red-Figure Vase-Painters, Vol. II, Second edition, Oxford, 1963, p. 1479, no. 35, pl. 3,24.
The Amazon Painter is a representative of the Kerch style, the last phase of Athenian red-figured pottery. In this period the main market for Athenian vases moved from Southern Italy, now saturated by local production, to the Black Sea region. Interestingly, according to S. Korti-Konti, in antiquity amazons were associated with the region of Thrace and the choice of representing them on export vases might have been an attempt to appeal to the new audience, cf. S. Korti-Konti, Allusions to Mythological sites in Macedonia in the vase-painting of the 4th century B.C., the satyrical drama and Aristotle, in The Macedonians in Athens, Oxford, 2003, p. 236.
The Amazon Painter is a representative of the Kerch style, the last phase of Athenian red-figured pottery. In this period the main market for Athenian vases moved from Southern Italy, now saturated by local production, to the Black Sea region. Interestingly, according to S. Korti-Konti, in antiquity amazons were associated with the region of Thrace and the choice of representing them on export vases might have been an attempt to appeal to the new audience, cf. S. Korti-Konti, Allusions to Mythological sites in Macedonia in the vase-painting of the 4th century B.C., the satyrical drama and Aristotle, in The Macedonians in Athens, Oxford, 2003, p. 236.