1 more
AN ATTIC RED-FIGURED NOLAN AMPHORA

ATTRIBUTED TO THE TITHONOS PAINTER, CIRCA 470-460 B.C.

Details
AN ATTIC RED-FIGURED NOLAN AMPHORA
ATTRIBUTED TO THE TITHONOS PAINTER, CIRCA 470-460 B.C.
12 ¹/₂ in. (31.7 cm.) high
Provenance
with Galleria Serodine, Ascona.
Dr. Manfred Zimmermann (1935-2011), Bremen, Germany, acquired from the above, 1989; thence by descent to the current owner.
Literature
M. Steinhart, Das Motiv des Auges in der griechischen Bildkunst, Mainz, 1995, pp. 112-113, n. 1007, pl. 45.
M. Steinhart, Töpferkunst und Meisterzeichnung: Attische Wein- und Ölgefässe aus der Sammlung Zimmermann, Mainz, 1996, pp. 110-113, no. 24, pl. 17.
A.W. Johnston, Trademarks on Greek Vases: Addenda, Warminster, 2006, Type 19F, p. 159.
F. Hildebrandt, Antike Bilderwelten: Was griechische Vasen erzählen, Darmstadt, 2017, pp. 92, 94, fig. 90; p. 144, no. 11.
Beazley Archive Pottery Database no. 46963.
Exhibition
Bremen, Antikenmuseum im Schnoor, 2005-2018.
Hamburg, Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe, 2018-2023.

Brought to you by

Maxwell-Murphy
Maxwell Murphy Associate Specialist
Get in touch for additional information about this lot

Lot Essay

Each side features a single figure isolated against the black ground in the manner perfected by the Berlin Painter and adopted by his pupils, including the Tithonos Painter, to whom this amphora is attributed. On one side a warrior stands with his right arm outstretched, holding a phiale. With his left hand he holds a spear, a circular shield with a lion as the blazon and an apron adorned with an eye and a brow. He is equipped with a crested helmet and wears a cuirass over a chitoniskos. On the other side, a female attendant (perhaps the warrior’s sister, wife or beloved), is enveloped in a himation and similarly holds a phiale in her outstretched hand and an oinochoe in the other. A band of meander is below each figure.

This vase is nearly identical to another also attributed to the Tithonos Painter, now in the Princeton University Art Museum (Inv. no. 1991-77; see “Acquisitions of the Art Museum 1991,” Record of the Art Museum Princeton University, vol. 51, no. 1, 1992, p. 71). For a discussion of departure scenes involving sacrificial libations, see pp. 230-231 in J.M. Padgett, ed., The Berlin Painter and His World: Athenian Vase-Painting in the Early Fifth Century B.C.).