Art Eyewitness Review: "Come Together" - Stories and Storytelling at the Morgan Library & Museum

 

Come Together: 3,000 Years of Stories and Storytelling

Morgan Library & Museum
 January 30 through May 3, 2026 

Reviewed by Ed Voves
Original photography by Anne Lloyd

Gather round, everyone! It's story time at the Morgan Library and Museum. Make yourselves comfortable because we have an amazing adventure to share.

 
In fact, the Morgan is serving-up three thousand years' worth of creation myths,  knights in shining armor, an impeccably-clad elephant and a little boy named Max who sails to the realm where "the Wild Things are."

Come Together at the Morgan traces the evolution of story-telling in human culture. 

Anne Lloyd, Photos (2026) 

A selection of works on view in the Come Together exhibit at the Morgan Library & Museum: a fragment of the Epic of Atrahasis., ca. 1646-1626 BC; Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales printed by William Caxton, ca. 1483; Charles Schultz’ “Peanuts” cartoon strip, September 8, 1973

From a cuneiform fragment relating to Atrahasis, a Noah-like figure from ancient Mesopotamia, to literary classics like The Canterbury Tales and beloved comic-strip characters, such is the scope of the Morgan exhibition.

If that sounds like a daunting task for the Morgan's curators to achieve, well it is. 

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) 

Gallery view of the Come Together: 3000 Years of Stories and Storytelling exhibition at the Morgan Library & Museum

Not to worry. The Morgan curators are more than equal to this challenge.

Come Together is a thoroughly absorbing survey of the creative responses to humanity's insatiable need to speak - and hear - for itself. Arranged in five thematic sections, 140 works of art and literature chart the course of storytelling across the ages. 

Almost all of the artifacts in the exhibition are from the Morgan's own collection. One notable exception, however, appears at the very beginning of the exhibit, a Native American mask on loan from the American Museum of Natural History. 

Kwakiutl Raven Mask, attributed to Bob Harris , ca. 1900,

 from the collection of the American Museum of Natural History

Ironically, the story that this remarkable mask helps to illustrate involves one of the most dramatic episodes in the Morgan Library's own history. The raven-head mask complements historic photographs and an early film of Native Americans created by Edward Curtis.

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) 

Edward Curtis photo of Kwakwaka´wakw Dancers, 1914

Edward Curtis (1868-1952), a self-taught artist of genius, started taking photographs of Native Americans living in the vicinity of Seattle, Washington. At first this was a side-line to his thriving photo portrait studio. Soon Curtis' growing obsession consumed his business, his marriage, eventually his life. 

With few remaining resources of his own, financial support from J.P. Morgan enabled Curtis to continue documenting Native American culture across the vast expanse of the U.S. and Canada. By the time he finished his quest, Curtis had taken 40,000 photos! Of these, 2,234 were published in his multi-volume masterpiece, The North American Indian.

Curtis, the son of a frontier settler of the Old West, might well have formed a very different opinion of the Native Americans he encountered. Curtis could have despised "the vanishing Red Man" as so many of his generation did. But his  empathy for them is an important point to consider. 

Many times, people we would least expect - strangers, competitors, even adversaries - play an important role in appreciating and preserving the art, literature and folk lore of cultures very different from their own.

A notable example of this can be found in the first section of Coming Together, "Belief and Belonging." This is an ancient bronze container known as a Praenestine Cista. It was found in a burial chamber near the city of Praeneste, today's Palestrina, twenty miles south of Rome.

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) 

Praenestine Cista with Cover, Italy, ca. 200 BC

Praeneste was a stronghold of the Etruscans, who frequently fought settlers from Greece for control of the rich agricultural lands of southern Italy. Despite this "bone of contention", the Etruscans admired Greek culture. Many of the Greek vases and ceramic vessels now on display in art museums around the world were unearthed from Etruscan tombs, as was this Praenestine Cista.  

The Etruscans were master metal workers, so the Praenestine Cista was almost certainly a work of their hands. Yet, it is engraved with images of Greek goddesses, perhaps a scene from the Trojan War.

If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, to be inspired by the art and ideals of a rival culture is a far greater tribute.

Creative inspiration and the challenge of translating ideas into word and image are the theme of the next two sections of Come Together. "Shaping Stories" and "Picture This" provide the setting for studying several modern-day classics in detail. 

Two of these displays, dealing with Jean de Brunhoff's Histoire de Babar, le petit elephant (1931) and the storyboard of the 1979 theatrical production of Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are (1963) stand-out as surefire crowd-pleasers. The "back-stories" of Babar and Wild Things also yield fascinating insights into the childhood (or childlike) sources of creativity. 

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) 

Preparatory artwork by Jean de Brunhoff for Histoire de Babar, le petit elephant, 1931. From top (left) Study for Text and Illustrations;

 Color Study for the Character of Babar; Dummy for p. 15

Babar's saga began with an impromptu bed-time story told by the wife of French illustrator, Jean de Brunhoff (1899-1937). Next day, the two young boys implored their father to create pictures of the orphan elephant. De Brunhoff set to work and Babar sprang to life in a series of wildly popular books. 

Tragically, de Brunhoff died from TB in 1937. Years later, one of his sons, Laurent (1925-2024), an accomplished artist, continued in his father's (and mother's) footsteps. By 2017, the Babar books totaled 44 in number, along with an animated TV series and endless merchandising spin-offs.

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) 

Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are - an image from the 1979 storyboard for the operatic version of the 1963 book.

In the case of Where the Wild Things Are, Maurice Sendak had to share the credits with a hyper-imaginative girl named Rosie who lived across the street from his boyhood home in Brooklyn. 

Back in the 1990's, I had the honor to interview Sendak for the Philadelphia Daily News. He related how, as a boy, illness often confined him to watching neighborhood children at play. One of them, Rosie, was the "author/director" and star of skits acted-out on the sidewalk and door stoops. 

What Sendak saw was childhood imagination at play - and at work. This is quite different from what adults often conceive it to be. Children's insights are deep and nuanced, seldom of the degree of innocence which their elders believe. These observations informed Sendak's lifelong approach to life and art.

Anne, Photo (2026) 

Maurice Sendak's 1979 storyboard 

for the operatic version of Where the Wild Things Are

The art works related to Where the Wild Things Are on view in Come Together were part of the 1980 operatic version of Max's adventures. For Sendak, this transition to the stage proved to be a very challenging endeavor. The first presentation was beset with a host of difficulties, though it was later revived successfully.

Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are has become an enduring work of art and literature, unifying people of different generations, races and social classes. It is part of the American canon. But it has to be wondered at, if any book, film or work of art of a more recent vintage can ever succeed to a similar degree.

Back in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries- and well into the twentieth -  a new novel by a major author like Charles Dickens or Mark Twain was a cause for celebration. The same was true for plays, operas and, later, films which appealed to a shared set of beliefs or a sense of humor.

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) 

A sequence of film frames from Charlie Chaplin's The Kid (1921)

A brilliant example of such mass appeal is Charlie Chaplin's The Kid (1921). This silent classic is presented in a continuous video loop in the exhibition galleries. We were so transfixed by The Little Tramp's attempt at parenting, that we lost track of time and then had to make a dash for the train!

Talk about the power of storytelling! 

Today, efforts to "frame a narrative" are much more difficult. Individualism has upstaged social cohesion. This is not a bad thing in itself. But trying to perceive cultural trends is increasingly problematic.

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) 

Gallery view of the Come Together exhibition.

 A 1980 drawing by Keith Haring appears at center.

The modern-day focus on personal expression supplies the theme of the final galleries of Come Together. There is a very diverse array of works on display. The Morgan curators attempted to supply something of a framework by casting many of these as "New York Stories."

Perhaps the best way to approach such diversity is to let these "personal" stories speak for themselves. Let our minds engage with the message of each and then wait to see if universal themes emerge.

That is what impressed me, in the case of The Book of Hours. This "wordless novel" by George A. Walker consists of 99 wood engravings depicting the hours leading up to the horrifying 9/11/01 attack on the World Trade Center. No text, just images.

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) 

Artist’s proof of a hand-printed wood engraving for

 George A. Walker’s The Book of Hours, 2008

Walker's The Book of Hours is a study of normal daily life, the routine of people going about their business on a September morning in 2001, no different than any other September morning...

 

And then, at 9:02 am, the World changed. A senseless tragedy ensued, followed by events, wars and rumors of wars, which are still in progress, all these years later.

There is no ending, no final frame, no moral lessons to be derived from The Book of Hours. 

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026)

Study of Robert Browning Reading by William Wetmore Story, 1869 

That is really true of all great stories, whatever medium is used. The writer may stop writing, the artist ceases to paint or draw, words no longer flow from the storyteller's lips. 

The conclusion of the story - and the conclusions to be drawn from it - that's where we come in. 

What comes next, in our own personal story or the cosmic drama in which we all play our part? That is up to us.

***

Text: Copyright of Ed Voves, all rights reserved                                               

Original photography, copyright of Anne Lloyd

Introductory image: Anne Lloyd, (Photo 2026) Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are - an image from the 1979 storyboard for the operatic version of the 1963 book. (See full storyboard image, below) 

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) A fragment of the Epic of Atrahasis., ca. 1646-1626 BC, First Dynasty of Babylon, Reign of King Ammi-saduqa. Clay The Morgan Library & Museum, MLC 1889; Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales printed by William Caxton, ca. 1483. Morgan Library & Museum MA 6304.8.4; Charles Schultz’ “Peanuts” cartoon strip, September 8, 1973. Pen and black ink, black felt pen and white paint on illustration board. Four panel strip: 6 7 x 30 inches (175 x 762 mm) Morgan Library & Museum #1973.49

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) Gallery view of the Come Together: 3000 Years of Stories and Storytelling exhibition at the Morgan Library & Museum. 

                                                                                 

Kwakiutl Raven Mask attributed to Bob Harris Collected in 1901 by George Hunt in Tsaxis/Fort Rupert, British Columbia, Canada American Museum of Natural History, Cat. No 16/8533 Accession 1901-32

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) Edward S. Curtis’ Photo of Kwakwaka´wakw Dancers with Hamatsa Masks, 1914. Published in The North American. Cambridge, U.S.A. The University Press, 1907-1930, Vol 10. Plate 336. PML 20032.2

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) Praenestine Cista with Cover, Italy, ca. 200 B.C Bronze, with incised surface decoration. Height (with lid) 14 ¼ inches (358 mm) Purchased by J. Pierpont Morgan, 1907. AZ046a-b

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) Preparatory artwork by Jean de Brunhoff for Histoire de Babar, le petit elephant, 1931. Study for text and illustrations, 1931. 13 x 9 ¾ in. (32.8 x 24.7 cm) Morgan Library & Museum MA 6304.4.01; Color study for the character of Babar, 1931. 14 3/8 x 10 ½ in (36.5 x 26.7 cm) Morgan Library & Museum MA 6304.8.4;Dummy for p. 15: 14 1/8 x 10 3/8 in. (36 x 26.5 cm) Morgan Library & Museum MA 6304.10.10 (recto)

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) Maurice Sendak's Where the Wild Things Are - an image from the 1979 storyboard for the operatic version of the 1963 book. Morgan Library and Museum

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) Maurice Sendak's  Storyboard (Where the Wild Things Are,1979). Watercolor, pen and ink and graphite pencil on paper. © The Maurice Sendak Foundation, 2013. Morgan Library and Museum 2013.72ab

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) A Sequence of Film Frames from Charlie Chaplin's The Kid, 1921. Running time: 68 minutes. Distributed by First National Pictures.

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) Gallery view of the Morgan Library & Museum exhibition, Come Together: 3000 years of Stories and Storytelling. A 1980 drawing by Keith Haring appears at center.

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) Artist’s proof of a hand-printed wood engraving for George A. Walkers The Book of Hours, a Wordless Novel / Told in 99 Wood Engravings, 2008. Morgan Library and Museum. PML 195745.

Anne Lloyd, Photo (2026) Studies of Robert Browning Reading by William Wetmore Story, 1869. Pencil on cream colored paper, laid down: 9 5/8 x 14 11/16 inches (245 x 374 mm) Morgan Library and Museum. #1954.5

Art Eyewitness Review: Rethinking Etruria at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World

Rethinking Etruria

Institute for the Study of the Ancient World

April 23 - July 25, 2025

Reviewed by Ed Voves

The Institute for the Study of the Ancient World (ISAW), located in the shadow of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, has added another achievement to its impressive credentials. ISAW, a research facility of New York University, has resolved a mystery of the so-called "mysterious" Etruscan people of ancient Italy.

As I discussed in a series of Art Eyewitness essays about the Etruscans, back in 2020, it is puzzling why there have been no major exhibitions dealing with the fascinating culture of the Etruscans for many decades in the United States. The ISAW solved that problem by presenting Rethinking Etruria, which opened on April 23rd at the Institute's 84th street headquarters.

Ed Voves, Photo (2025)

 Gallery views of the Rethinking Etruria exhibit. The top photo shows bronze votive figurines, 5th century B.C. and sandstone pyramidal bases, found at Poggio Colla. Below, are Kylix cups, 4th-3rd centuries, B.C., decorated by the Sokra Group of Etruscan vase & cup painters.

.

Etruscology is a vast and perplexing subject. A non-Indo-European people, the Etruscans were long thought to have migrated to Italy from Asia Minor (present-day Turkey) toward the end of the Bronze Age. Recent DNA studies have confirmed that the Etruscans - or their ancestors - were resident in Italy for a very long time, perhaps as far back as the Neolithic age.                     

                       

The historical Etruscan era extends from their earliest identifiable settlements, ca. 900 B.C., to the time of the conquest and incorporation of the Etruscan city-states by the Roman Republic over the succeeding centuries. By the time of Caesar Augustus, the Etruscans were fully under Rome's control, but it is worth noting that Maecenas, the adviser-in-chief to Augustus, was of Etruscan descent.

Since the ISAW has only two exhibition galleries, both of modest dimensions, it would be impossible to mount a wide-ranging exhibition devoted to the Etruscans. But as with other topics in ancient history which have featured in ISAW exhibits, the ISAW curators are accomplished in making a lot happen in a little space.

Ed Voves, Photo (2025)

 Gallery view of the Rethinking Etruria exhibit. In the background is a replica of the Vicchio Stele, excavated at Poggio Colla in 2015.

Rethinking Etruria focuses on two key sites in Italy which have yielded important discoveries, as recently as 2024.  These are the temple sanctuary of Poggio Colla, located near the town of Vicchio, northwest of Florence, and the spectacular tombs carved into a formidable ridge of tufa rock at Norchia, a rugged area seventy-two kilometers northwest of Rome.

The necropolis of Norchia is hardly a new, unexplored site of archaeological "digs." Norchia featured in the trailblazing expeditions of George Dennis, the "father of Etruscology."  Back in the early 1840's, Dennis and his friend, the artist Samuel Ainsley, roamed the bandit-infested region in search of ancient remains. Dennis recounted the moment of Norchia's discovery in his 1848 book, The Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria.

At length, we turned a corner in the glen, and lo! a grand range of monuments burst upon us. There were a line of sepulchers, high in the face of the cliff which forms the right-hand barrier of the glen, two or three hundred feet above the stream - an amphitheater of tombs!

Dennis was unable to capitalize on his success. A gifted amateur, he lacked private wealth, academic credentials or political patronage. Eventually, his book would ignite interest in Britain in the Etruscans - D.H. Lawrence was a devoted reader. 

In the meantime, it was left to another non-professional, this time from Italy, to conduct a thorough study of Norchia. In 1852, Mariano Lattanzi began excavating several of the temple-like tomb structures cut-into the cliff face of Norchia. Important discoveries have been made since then, but so have the deprivations of tomb robbers, who, heedless of the need to record the details of place and condition, have been the bane of Etruscology.

Ed Voves, Photo (2025)

 Gallery view of Rethinking Etruria, showing the Marce Atie Stamnos, a red-figure stamnos or wine jar, with scenes from the Trojan War. 

In July 2022, a splendid ceramic red-figure vessel, a stamnos, was unearthed in one of the less accessible of the Lattanzi tombs. Evidently, tomb robbers had missed this and several other important, if less spectacular, artifacts, preserved in the tomb.

Known today as the Marce Atie Stamnos, the vessel depicts heroes from the Trojan War: Achilles, Ajax, Nestor and Troilus. Scholars believe that it was created around 330 B.C. in the Etruscan city of Vulci. The Trojan War imagery is credited to a workshop of Etruscan painters called the "Funnel Group" because of the shape of the decorative motif.

Ed Voves, Photo (2025)

 The Greek hero, Achilles, depicted on the Marce Atie Stamnos

And a heroine, too, is shown on the Marce Atie Stamnos. This was an important consideration for the Etruscans who accorded great respect - and property-owning rights - to women. Here we see the Amazon queen, Penthesilea, riding to death and glory before the walls of Troy.

Ed Voves, Photo (2025)

 The Amazon Queen, Penthesilea, killed by Achilles at Troy

A stamnos was used to hold wine for celebrations and religious ceremonies - or in this case as a tomb offering, much as the ancient Egyptians did. 

Ed Voves, Photo (2025)

 On its rim, the Marce Atie Stamnos is inscribed with the name of  

 "Marce Atie (son) of Velxae (and) Paci (or Puci)"

The rim of this ceramic vessel is inscribed with the name of Marce Atie, who commissioned it. He must have been a man with considerable wealth and piety to be able to afford such a lavish gift for use in the "after life."

Ed Voves, Photo (2025)

 Gallery view of Rethinking Etruria. Displayed, at left, behind the

 Marce Atie Stamnos, is a much-eroded portrait of Alexander the Great

Museum authorities in Italy have generously permitted this magnificent vessel to travel to the U.S. for the first time. Although there are fifty important Etruscan artifacts on view in the ISAW exhibition, the Marce Atie Stamnos is such a spectacular work of art that I found it difficult to devote sufficient time and attention to the rest of the exhibition.

This is a problem, for there is much in Rethinking Etruria to study and appreciate. The ISAW exhibition team has facilitated the learning process, however, through short digital image/text displays. These presentations enable visitors to comprehend the exhibition artifacts within the context of Etruscan culture and to visualize the temple of Poggio Colla and the Norchia tombs in their topographical settings.

Much of the information in these presentations is based on the ability of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to sift and integrate masses of data. Drone photographic surveys supplied the details of terrain. The resulting visualizations of what the Norchia "amphitheater of tombs" and the Poggio Colla temple looked like in antiquity are almost magical.

Ed Voves, Photo (2025)

 Two images from the Rethinking Etruria digital presentations. At top, is an aerial view of the Norchia tombs taken by a drone. Below is an AI rendering of the temple-like sepulchers, as they likely appeared in antiquity. Some of these family tombs could hold 80 bodies. 

AI rendering of the Poggio Colla temple as it appeared in antiquity.

© Institute for the Study of the Ancient World (NYU)

AI and 3D imaging were also combined to create a replica of the Stele of Vicchio, found in 2015 during excavations at Poggio Colla. Made of local sandstone, the Vicchio Stele is a gravestone-shaped marker which functioned in similar fashion to representations of tablets showing the Ten Commandments. 

Considering the reputation of the Etruscans as "the most religious of men", the discovery of the Vicchio Stele is an event of great importance. After further study, the stele may resolve some of the mystery of Etruscan sacred beliefs and rituals. 

Ed Voves, Photo (2025)

 A replica of the Vicchio Stele, excavated at Poggio Colla in 2015. The 3D model of the stele was created by the LaGuardia Studio of NYU.

Dating to the 6th century B.C., the Vicchio Stele measures 3.9 by 1.9 feet (1.2 by 0.6 meters) and weighs 500 pounds (227 kg). The stele is inscribed with 120 legible letters and punctuation marks from the Etruscan alphabet. But only one passage of the inscription has been deciphered:

"Of Tinia (or for Tinia) in the (place) of Uni two (objects) were dedicated." 

3D model of the Vicchio Stele with its four inscriptions highlighted.

© Institute for the Study of the Ancient World (NYU)

Tinia and Uni were two of the Etruscan gods. The Vicchio Stele originally stood upright so that people visiting the temple could read the religious inscriptions. Over the course of time, the Poggio Colla temple was burned and rebuilt. During the rebuilding process, the Vicchio Stele was placed in with the foundation stones, helping to strengthen the rising new temple.

There was nothing perfunctory about Etruscan religious practice. The Etruscans lived in close communion with the gods and were notable for their practice of divination. A written code of sacred beliefs and rituals, passed down from the gods to a prophet named Tages, was the foundation of Etruscan civilization.

Scarcely visible today, the inscriptions on the Vicchio Stele were words to live by. Deciphering these cryptic words constitutes a big - if halting - step forward in understanding Etruscan religion.

AI, drone photography, lazer scanning and digital recreations have added immeasurably to our understanding of the ancient world. However, there are occasions when simple photos, taken on the spur-of-the-moment, can rival even the most cutting-edge technology. Below are two photos, recording the excavation of the Marc Atie Stamnos. The look on the face of one of the archaeologists speaks for itself!

Ed Voves, Photo (2025)

 Two images from the Rethinking Etruria digital presentations, showing the excavation of the Marce Atie Stamnos.

The exhilaration of holding a just-excavated treasure like the Marce Atie Stamnos is a pleasure few of us will ever enjoy. But the curators and staff at ISAW have served-up a special treat for history lovers to share when they visit Rethinking Etruria. 

                          

Yes, go ahead and place your fingers on the replica of the Vicchio Stele! Get in touch with history. Feel the sensation of the "mysterious" Etruscans awakening from the sleep of centuries.

***

Text: Copyright of Ed Voves, all rights reserved.                                                  Original photography, copyright of Ed Voves.

 Introductory Image:                                                                                     Ed Voves, Photo (2025) Detail of the Marce Atie Stamnos, showing the Amazon queen, Penthesilea.

The following two images come from the ISAW web pages for the Rethinking Etruria exhibition and are copyright of ISAW/NYU:

AI rendering of the Poggio Colla temple as it appeared in antiquity.

© Institute for the Study of the Ancient World (NYU)

 

 3D model of the Vicchio Stele with its four inscriptions highlighted.

 © Institute for the Study of the Ancient World (NYU)                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

Art Eyewitness Book Review: The Sarpedon Krator by Nigel Spivey

The Sarpedon Krater:

The Life and Afterlife of a Greek Vase

By Nigel Spivey

University of Chicago Press/256 pages/$25

Reviewed by Ed Voves

Of the thousands of ancient Greek vases which fill museum cases around the world, one is particularly notable. Had this review been written a decade earlier, the Sarpedon Krater would more likely have been described as "notorious" than notable. 

Thereby "hangs a tale," as the old saying goes. 

The story of the Sarpedon Krater has been brilliantly told by Nigel Spivey, author and presenter of the BBC television series, How Art Made the World. Spivey traces the strange and wondrous journey of the Sarpendon Krater from ancient Athens in the sixth century B.C. to the present.

The Sarpendon Krater's notoriety resulted from its theft by a gang of Italian tombaroli or tomb robbers in December 1971.The crime scene was the Etruscan burial ground of Greppe Sant'Angelo located in Tuscany. These cliff tombs housed the ashes and grave goods of Etruscan nobles from the ancient city state of Caere, now called Cerveteri. The vase was part of the rich store of Greek luxury goods purchased by the Etruscans. Their wealth from vast deposits of iron and copper ore enabled them to buy the best that the Greeks had to offer.

Euphronios and Euxitheos, The Sarpedon Krater,  ca. 515-510 B.C.

© Cerveteri, Museo Archeologico

In the autumn of 1972, the Metropolitan Museum of Art announced that it had purchased the Sarpedon Krater, the "finest Greek vase there is" according to a Met publicity release from the time. Almost immediately, "red flags" began waving. Where had this incredible red-figure Athenian krater or wine-mixing vase come from? It was a very good question and an inconvenient one.

The two officials of the Met who were responsible for purchasing the Sarpedon Krater should have examined its provenance more closely. The curator in charge of the Met's celebrated Greek and Roman galleries was Dietrich von Bothmer, one of the world's greatest authorities on ancient art. The Met's director, Thomas Hoving, was a master-mind of publicity and revenue-generating exhibitions. Neither could resist the temptation of adding the Sarpedon Krater to the Met's collection.

The third figure in the million dollar transaction was Bob Hecht, an art dealer whose reputation was hedged in question marks. Hecht claimed that the Sarpedon Krater came from the collection of an elderly Armenian, Dikran Sarrafian, who needed to provide for his retirement. Sarrafian died a few years later in suspicious car accident.The murky, tortuous plot, with Italian officials in pursuit of the tombaroli and Hecht, is deftly handled by Spivey and need not detain us.

From the standpoint of the visual art scene, however, it is important to acknowledge the role of Philippe de Montebello, who replaced Hoving as director at the Met. In a brilliant stroke of damage control, de Montebello repatriated the Sarpedon Krater to Italy in 2008. By way of compensation, the Italian government has provided generous cooperation in mounting many of the outstanding exhibitions which the Met has featured since then.

Perhaps the greatest long-term benefit of returning the Sarpedon Krater is liberating it from the contention which shrouded its time at the Met. De Montebello's decision has given the Sarpedon Krater the opportunity to be studied and appreciated as the profoundly moving work of art which it is. Nigel Spivey does exactly that, in a book that is a model of insight, concise detail and thoughtful, immensely readable prose.

There are two signatures on the Sarpedon Krater: Euxitheos and Euphronios. The first of these craftsmen was the man who shaped and fired the vase. Euxitheos the potter, despite the high caliber of his work, has only a "walk-on" role. The tale of the creation of the Sarpedon Krater is the story of Euphronios. 

The Sarpedon Krater (detail)

The Sarpedon Krater depicts a scene from the Trojan War. Two spiritual beings clad in military uniforms are shown grasping the bleeding, prostrate body of a handsome young warrior. The divine messenger, Mercury, directs the duo, Thanatos (Death) and Hypnos (Sleep), as they prepare to transmit the dead warrior, Sarpedon, to his tomb.

The great vase or krater which Euxitheos and Euphronios jointly created was, almost certainly, made for an elite gathering of Athenians, a symposium. Students of philosophy will recognize this familiar term from the writings of Plato.

A symposium mixed serious discussion with wine drinking and - very often - drunken revelry. Spivey discusses the symposium in great detail, reflecting on why such a  scene such as the burial detail of Sarpedon should have been the subject of the wine krater for a symposium. And it was not just the vase which was decorated in such an alarming fashion. A kylix or wine cup often had images of celestial beings gathering fallen heroes in their arms.

Eos with the Body of Memnon, ca. 490-480 B.C.

© Musée du Louvre

After draining your cup of joy, your eyes would behold a sobering sight. In the celebrated example (above) from the Louvre, Eos mourns for another slain Trojan, Memnon. At least for the first few rounds of a symposium, there would be no escaping from reminders of mortality.

The Sarpedon Krater is signed by Euphronios but most of the masters of Athenian vase painting are not known by their proper name. Instead, an artificial title has been conferred upon them by modern art scholars. The most famous case of such an I.D. process is the career of the "Berlin Painter." This contemporary of Euphronios received his title based upon a work in the collection of a Berlin museum which was closely studied by Sir John Beazley, a British scholar of Greek vase painting around the time of World War I.

Beazley established a methodology by which characteristic details of drawing, often very small and idiosyncratic, can be used to establish the identity of Greek vase painters.  Frustratingly, Euphronios did not feature any absolutely unique details which separate him from other Athenian vase painters. Yet it is possible to ascribe a signature "brand" to Euphronios and one, moreover, of the highest quality. Spivey notes:

Regardless of minor details, Euphronios fund a style, and a mode of composition, that enabled him to broach grand themes of drama and epic - themes that would suit large- scale painting well enough, but required skill and distillation if they were to fit upon a vase.

The "grand themes of drama and epic" of the vases painted by Euphronios appealed to Etruscan nobles, who placed Athenian masterpieces in their tombs. However, the Sarpedon Krater, and others like it, did not simply disappear into the burial chambers of the Etruscans. Examples of death scenes from mythology were featured on elaborate sarcophagi which remained above ground during the Roman era. Many of these featured the death scene of the hero Meleager, from the poems of Ovid.

Marble sarcophagus fragment depicting the death of Meleager, 2nd century A.D.

© Metropolitan Museum of Art

The example of a Meleager sarcophagus, above, comes from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Spivey uses other versions from Italian collections in his book, but I especially value this one which was restored during the 1500's. From Euphronios and the Roman sarcophagi sculptors there is a direct line of transmission to the masters of the Renaissance, which Spivey expertly traces in his concluding chapters.

Raphael, Pen-an-ink study of the Deposition, ca. 1507

© British Museum 

Raphael's pen-an-ink drawing of the deposition of the body of Jesus was one of sixteen preparatory sketches for a 1507 oil painting, commissioned for the chapel of an aristocratic family, the Baglioni of Perugia. He was clearly influenced by Meleager sarcophagi from antiquity. The "wheel" has come full-circle from Euphronias, but the instinctual human attempt to find transcendence in the face of death goes on.

This very fine book deals with universal issues which one day will directly concern each of us. A sobering reflection perhaps, like drinking the last of the wine in a symposium kylix and glimpsing the picture of a warrior's corpse being readied for burial. But the Sarpedon Krater is also a noble affirmation of the imperishable human soul, much in keeping with John Donne's reminder to Death to "be not proud."

One short sleep past, we wake eternally                                                                         

And death shall be no more; Death, thou shalt die.

***

Text: Copyright of Ed Voves, all rights reserved                                                                                           

Introductory Image:                                                                                    

Cover Illustration of The Sarpedon Krater, courtesy of The University of Chicago Press and Head of Zeus Publishing, Ltd, London

Euphronios and Euxitheos, The Sarpedon Krater,  ca. 515-510 B.C. Attic red-ware ceramics: 45.7 cm. (18 inches) Height, 55.15 cm. (21.7 inches) diameter of mouth. Cerveteri, Museo Archeologico.

Eos with the Body of Memnon, interior of a kylix by Douris, from Capua, ca. 490-480 B.C., Paris, Musée du Louvre, G 115

Unknown Roman artist, Antonine era, Marble sarcophagus fragment depicting the death of Meleager, mid-2nd century A.D. Marble (Luni and Pentelic): 38 1/8 in. × 8 3/4 in. × 46 7/8 in. (96.8 × 22.2 × 119.1 cm) Metropolitan Museum of Art. Rogers Fund, 1920. #20.187

Raphael (Italian, 1483 - 1520) Pen-and-brown study for the Deposition (also called the the Baglione 'Entombment', ca. 1507. Pen-and-brown ink on paper: 213 millimetres (height)  X 319 millimetres (width), inscribed: "R.V." British Museum. #1963,1216.1