page_title: Hellenistic art
section_title: Paintings and mosaics
hierarchical_section_title: Hellenistic art / Paintings and mosaics
caption_attribution_description: Alexander Mosaic (detail), House of the Faun, Pompeii
context_page_description: The art of the Hellenistic time is sculpture and painting and other things. For a long time, people said that the art of that time was not good. Pliny the Elder talked about the Greek sculpture of the classical time and then said Cessavit deinde ars. But much good art is from the Hellenistic time. Many people know about the sculptures Laocoön and Venus de Milo and Winged Victory of Samothrace.
  Now more people have looked at writing about the Hellenistic time. People discovered art from the Hellenistic time at Vergina and other places. Now people can see that the art of the Hellenistic time is very good art.
context_section_description: Few Greek wall paintings have survived the centuries.  However, we can study the Hellenistic influences in Roman frescoes, for example those of Pompeii or Herculaneum.  Certain mosaics provide a pretty good idea of the "grand painting" of the period:  these are copies of frescoes.  An example is the Alexander Mosaic, showing the confrontation of the young conqueror and the Grand King Darius III at the Battle of Issus, a mosaic which adorns the walls of the House of the Faun at Pompeii.  It is believed to be a copy of a work described by Pliny the Elder (XXXV, 110) which had been painted by Philoxenus of Eretria for King Cassander of Macedon at the end of the 4th century BC. The mosaic allows us to admire the choice of colours, the composition of the ensemble with turning movement and facial expressivity.
  Archeological discoveries at the cemetery of Pagasae (close to modern Volos), at the edge of the Pagasetic Gulf, or again at Vergina (1987), in the former kingdom of Macedonia, have brought to light some original works.  For example, the tomb said to be that of Philip II has provided a great frieze representing a royal lion hunt, remarkable by its composition, the arrangement of the figures in space and its realistic representation of nature.
  The Hellenistic period is equally the time of development of the mosaic, particularly with the works of Sosos of Pergamon, active in the 2nd century BC and the only mosaic artist cited by Pliny (XXXVI, 184).  His taste for
  trompe l'oeil (optical illusion) and the effects of the medium are found in several works attributed to him such as the "Unswept Floor" in the Vatican museum, representing the leftovers of a repast (fish bones, bones, empty shells, etc.) and the "Dove Basin" at the Capitoline Museum, known by means of a reproduction discovered in Hadrian's Villa.  In it one sees four doves perched on the edge of a basin filled with water.  One of them is watering herself while the others seem to be resting, which creates effects of reflections and shadow perfectly studied by the artist.
caption: The Alexander Mosaic, from the House of the Faun, Pompeii, now at the National Archaeological Museum, Naples
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