Lot Essay
On either side of a funerary stele (only barely discernable) stand two female figures. To the left is a girl, wearing a long diaphanous chiton, with her head angled forward. At her feet is a diphros (stool) upon which is placed her mantle. To the right stands her attendant, clad in a red chiton, holding an elongated basket of fruit in her right hand and a fan with a long handle in her left. The scene is framed above by a band of meander, and there are palmettes and tendrils on the shoulders.
The Woman Painter takes his name from the beauty of the woman depicted on his funerary scenes. His larger lekythoi feature three figures, while the smaller examples have two. The downturned head of some of his figures, as seen on the left figure on the present vase, “lend an air of sadness to the scene” (see J.H. Oakley, Picturing Death in Classical Athens, The Evidence of the Lekythoi, p. 17).
The Woman Painter takes his name from the beauty of the woman depicted on his funerary scenes. His larger lekythoi feature three figures, while the smaller examples have two. The downturned head of some of his figures, as seen on the left figure on the present vase, “lend an air of sadness to the scene” (see J.H. Oakley, Picturing Death in Classical Athens, The Evidence of the Lekythoi, p. 17).