Zeuxis | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | c. 464 BCE |
| Died | c. 4th century BCE[1] Place of death unknown |
| Cause of death | Death from laughter |
| Occupation | Painter |
Zeuxis (/ˈzjuːksɪs/;Ancient Greek:Ζεῦξις)[2] (ofHeraclea) was a late 5th-century- early 4th-century BCE Greek artist famed for his ability to create images that appeared highly realistic.[3][4] None of his works survive, but anecdotes about Zeuxis's art and life have been referenced often in the history and literature of art and inart theory.[5]
Much of the information about Zeuxis comes fromPliny the Elder'sNatural History, but his work is also discussed byXenophon[6] andAristotle.[7] One of the most famous stories about Zeuxis centers on an artistic competition with the artistParrhasius to prove which artist could create a greater illusion of nature.[8] Zeuxis,Timanthes, andParrhasius were painters of the Ionian School of painting. The Ionian School flourished during the 4th century BCE.[9][10][11]
Zeuxis was born in Heraclea in 464 BCE, probablyHeraclea Lucania, in the present-day region ofBasilicata in the southeastern "boot" of Italy.[12] He may have studied with Demophilus of Himera (Sicily), or with Neseus of Thasos (an island in the northernAegean Sea), and/or with the Greek painterAppollodorus.[citation needed]
He was active across the ancient Greek world from Magna Graecia to Ephesus, to Macedonia, Samos and to Athens where his greatest number of works were made.[13] The "Eros" of the temple of Aphrodite and the "Penelope" were some of his first works. Records cite his notable works asHelen,Zeus Enthroned, andThe Infant Hercules Strangling the Serpents. He also painted an assembly of gods,Eros crowned with roses,Alcmene,Menelaus, an athlete,Pan,Marsyas chained, and an old woman. KingArchelaus I of Macedon employed Zeuxis to decorate the palace of his new capitalPella with a picture of Pan.[14] Most of his works went toRome andByzantium but disappeared during the time ofPausanias.
Zeuxis was an innovative Greek painter. Although his paintings have not survived, historical records state they were known for their realism, small scale, novel subject matter, and independent format. His technique created volumetric illusion by manipulating light and shadow, a change from the usual method of filling in shapes with flat colors. Preferring small-scale panels to murals, Zeuxis also introduced genre subjects (such as still life) into painting. He contributed to the composite method of composition and may have originated an approach to, and thus influenced the concept of the ideal form of the nude, as described by art historianKenneth Clark. As the story goes, according toCicero,[15] Zeuxis could not find a woman beautiful enough to pose asHelen of Troy, the most beautiful woman in the world, so he selected the finest features of five different models of the city ofCroton to create a composite image of ideal beauty.[16]
According to theNaturalis Historia byPliny the Elder, Zeuxis and his contemporaryParrhasius (ofEphesus and laterAthens) staged a contest to determine the greater artist. When Zeuxis unveiled his painting of grapes, they appeared so real that birds flew down to peck at them. But when Parrhasius, whose painting was concealed behind a curtain, asked Zeuxis to pull aside that curtain, the curtain itself turned out to be a painted illusion. Parrhasius won, and Zeuxis said, "I have deceived the birds, but Parrhasius has deceived Zeuxis." This story was commonly referred to in 18th and 19th-centuryart theory to promote spatial illusion in painting. A similaranecdote says that Zeuxis once drew a boy holding grapes, and when birds, once again, tried to peck them, he was extremely displeased, stating that he must have painted the boy with less skill since the birds would have feared to approach otherwise.
According to the Roman grammarianFestus, Zeuxisdied laughing at a picture of an old woman he had just painted.[17][18]
The legend is mentioned inKarel van Mander'sSchilder-boeck (1604)[19] and is known by later artists who alluded to the story in their self-portraits, such asRembrandt'sSelf-Portrait as Zeuxis Laughing (c. 1662),Aert de Gelder'sSelf-Portrait as Zeuxis (1685),[20] and possiblyJean-Étienne Liotard'sSelf-Portrait Laughing (c. 1770).[19]
Zeuxis is briefly mentioned in the preface ofDon Quixote byCervantes:
Of all this there will be nothing in my book, for I have nothing to quote in the margin or to note at the end, and still less do I know what authors I follow in it, to place them at the beginning, as all do, under the letters A, B, C, beginning with Aristotle and ending withXenophon, orZoilus, or Zeuxis, though one was a slanderer and the other a painter.[21]
and is mentioned byLaurence Sterne inTristram Shandy :
[…] it was as casual as the foam of Zeuxis his horse […]
Also byMark Twain inThe Innocents Abroad:
As we turned and moved again through the temple, I wished that the illustrious men who had sat in it in the remote ages could visit it again and reveal themselves to our curious eyes—Plato, Aristotle, Demosthenes, Socrates, Phocion, Pythagoras, Euclid, Pindar, Xenophon, Herodotus, Praxiteles and Phidias, Zeuxis the painter.[22]
The story told of the manner of his death, namely, that he choked with laughing at a picture of an old woman which he had just painted (Festus,s.v.Pictor), furnishes another instance of those fictions which the ancient grammarians were so fond of inventing, in order to make the deaths of great men correspond with the character of their lives.
Pictor Zeuxis risui mortuus, dum ridet effuse pictam a se anum γραῦν.
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