Aristotle's Poetics and the Painters

Field: Arts and Humanities (Social Sciences)

Aristotle's Poetics and the Painters Graham Zanker Aristotle's Poetics uses the example of painting as an analogy to illustrate certain facts about poetry, specifically epic, tragedy, and comedy. But the use of painting as an analogy, though ancillary to Aristotle's subject, should yield evidence, if properly evaluated, on how the philosopher thought about painting, because the use of a thing as an analogy actually depends on how its user regards the thing. We can legitimately infer Aristotle's opinions about certain aspects of painting from his comments about poetic mimesis, because analogy is by nature reflexive, or symmetrical: if poetry resembles painting in certain respects, then painting must in turn resemble poetry in those respects. And since, as I hope to show, the characteristics in question can be clearly defined from the Poetics, and since the terms denoting them are given consistent meanings throughout the treatise in regard to poetry, it would be all the more inconceivable that Aristotle did not mean the same with these terms when he applied them to painting. In fact, Aristotle's views on painting are important for establishing how painting was perceived in the fourth century B.C., at least in certain respects which I suggest are well worth noting. Here I refer in particular to the question of subject matter, the aspect of morality, and the issue of idealization in classical Greek painting. This short essay, then, is offered as an example of how an ancient treatise on literary aesthetics can benefit the art historian, especially by providing a framework within which the Greeks themselves viewed the art of their time. It is vital, first of all, to establish precisely what Aristotle is referring to when he says that poets represent people in action and that it is necessary that these be (48a1-6). For this I offer the following provisional and unprejudicial translation, the precise points of reference of which will be defined in the course of my argument: "either serious men () or insignificant men () . . . , either better () than our level or worse () or of like level () as well, just like the painters, [End Page 225] for Polygnotus depicted superior people (), Pauson inferior, and Dionysius people of like level ()." This passage is often taken to refer to the moral status of the characters in poetry and in the paintings of Polygnotus, Pauson, and Dionysius. This is particularly so in the case of modern art historians. Rouveret, for example, affirms without substantiation that "pour Aristote, toute action est colorée par un ethos, d'autre part, les ethé se regroupent en deux catégories principales, les et les . Ces deux groupes déterminent deux types de mimesis tragique et comique. La tragédie représente donc toujours des " (1989, 132).1 And, having defined and in this way, she tries to show (121-61) how the text illuminates Aristotle's comment that Polygnotus was an while Zeuxis was not (50a25). But there are compelling reasons for believing that the reference here is basically to social class, with a flow-on effect on moral status.2 [End Page 226] In that case, according to Aristotle, tragedians and Polygnotus depict people of superior social status, comedy and Pauson represent people of inferior social status, and an unspecified literary genre (a type of tragedy if the Cleophon of 48a12 is the Athenian tragedian mentioned in the Suda)3 as well as the painter Dionysius (in all likelihood the fifth-century painter mentioned by Pliny at NH 35.113) depict people of an average social status "like you and me" (). That the reference is primarily social is clear in that the , who are the proper province of tragedy according to Aristotle, are described at 53a10-12 as people of high repute and in great prosperity, , the "people of distinction" like Oedipus and Thyestes, who are members of distinguished families.4 The social reference of these terms in the Poetics is secured, and the relationship of the concepts denoted by them to moral considerations can be illustrated by reference to 54a19-22. There Aristotle argues that it is a prime requisite of tragedy that its characters be morally good, , in order that the true tragic effect...