Artwork Blog Post Week 3

Artemision Zeus or Poseidon

  For this week's blog post, I decided to pick Artemision Zeus or Poseidon; this wonderful artwork was made during 460 B.C.E.¹ and is bronze, which was very common during this time, but few bronze sculptures survived. The bronze sculpture sat at the bottom of the sea for millennia until discovered by an old shipwreck near Greece. This sculpture has such a memorizing look that you would know that this is the depiction of a God without even questioning your thoughts, wondering if it is or not. As to be predicted, this piece was very important during this time because it was able to show the power the god was able to have within such a small amount of space to show his superiority. The strength in his stride is sure something I would not like to be in front of because the god looks like he is preparing to release something, and it will be powerful when released. The statue's stance is surely a different style to show off the god's demeanor and how capable the god is to balance his body weight for such a powerful attack. The orientation of this sculpture is called severe style, and this is how the statue is standing with his weight on the back leg and his expanding wingspan of more than 6 feet to show all the god-like features he has to offer to society. The statue structure is so bold and powerful where it refrains from being flat with no definition. Sadly, this artwork is still in question to see what god it could be, either Poseidon, the god of the sea, or his brother Zeus the ruler of all the Olympian gods. The sculpture once held a great weapon, narrowing down its possibilities, either Poseidon or Zeus. Even though they don't know which god it is, they can tell the artist put a lot of work to show the god's strength and control over the world. This artwork is bronze; to see it in its true glory would be magnificent as the bronze would be glowing and blinding to everyone who saw this piece; this statue is rare and one of a kind with how persevered it is compared to others.   

Closer look at Artemision

Zeus or Poseidon

The second picture is a nice up-close image that shows all the great detail the artist made sure to input within the face structure of the god. The sculpture's face is very masculine and intimidating to look at as he looks like a strong leader.  The artist put a lot of consideration when it came to the detail of the sculpture focusing more on the detail of the face and less on the body, but still able to bring out the aspect of what the perfect male body of a god would be like at a citizens point of view. This figure breaks away from the previous methods, and it's so remarkable that he looks superhuman by his very open diaphragm that the artist made sure to add to the sculpture to help define their god-like appearance. The Greeks were able to perfect the male human body and show that we reflect the god's body and their power through different styles of artwork. Many artists wanted to show off the muscular figures of the gods to show how superior their bodies are compared to any other human body.  Since this figure is willing to break away from past methods, it shows how powerful the gods' leadership is over everyone, and it's a great depiction of what it is like to be a god.

Citation:

¹Dr. Beth Harris and Dr. Steven Zucker, "Artemision Zeus or Poseidon," in Smarthistory, December 15, 2015, accessed September 9, 2021, https://smarthistory.org/artemision-zeus-or-poseidon/.