ATTRIBUTED TO THE BOWDOIN PAINTER, CIRCA 480-470 B.C.

The white-ground technique in Attic vase-painting is characterized by the application of a clay slip to all or part of the vessel, which turned white when the vase was fired, creating a background for decoration. The outline technique, as seen on this vase, differs from traditional black-figure in that the scene is rendered primarily through its external contours, rather than being shown in silhouette with details incised. As J. Mertens notes (pp. 189-190 in B. Cohen ed., The Colors of Clay: Special Techniques in Athenian Vases) the addition of a white slip “serves the pictorial and coloristic ambitions of the painter.” The outline technique was not only influenced by the rise of red-figure painting but also serves to link vase-painting with-wall painting, an important medium in the early Classical Period that has scarcely survived.

Depicted on the body of this large lekythos is Artemis, walking to the right, holding a bow and two arrows in her outstretched left hand, with a quiver suspended behind her. In front of the goddess, painted in silhouette but for the tail drawn in outline, is a prancing fawn and there is a nonsense inscription before her. For a similar example by the Bowdoin Painter, see the lekythos in the University of Mississippi Museum, pl. XL, nos. 1a-b in D.M. Robinson and S.E. Freeman, eds., Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum: United States of America, The Robinson Collection, vol. III.