Question 1

How were the Gods portrayed in ancient Greek art and how has that changed over time?

In Ancient Greek mythology the Gods were seen as the founders of life and everything in it. They were the reason behind all unexplained phenomenon and the justification of why people acted as they did. The Greeks found many ways to portray them, and the easiest to see is in their artwork. The ancient Greek people painted mostly on vases and pots, and these are some of the first known paintings of the Greek Gods.

The Gods portrayed on the pots are easy to recognize because they have distinctive features and stances that set them apart. For instance, Zeus was always depicted with a beard and a lightening bolt. These all symbolize strength, cunning and wisdom, and have been carried throughout art history along with Zeus.

Although our view of art has changed, Zeus and how he is depicted has not. He is a figure of strength and authority, and artists associate that with manliness, symbolised with a beard, no matter what time they lived in. This statement is strengthened by the painting 'Zeus and Thetis' by Anton Losenko. It was painted in 1769, hundreds of years after the original pot paintings, and depicts Zeus wearing nothing but a red cloth. This differs from the ancient pot paintings by the absence of either the lightening bolt or the eagle, and instead has a red cloth, the colour of strength and power. The main similarity in both pictures of Zeus is his beard. This also applies to Poseidon. He was a powerful God, and was also depicted with a beard in all paintings of him. This can be seen in the painting 'Neptune and Amymone', with Neptune being the Roman equivilent of Poseidon.

Hades image, however, as changed dramatically. In ancient Greek mythology Hades was the God of the underworld. But over time people have changed him into the Devil, and the underworld into hell. Hades was depicted, in ancient paintings, with a laurel wreath around his head, and is usually painted on a throne. This gave him a feeling of royalty and power. In modern art the devil, or the new Hades, is shown holding a forked trident, and sometimes has horns and a forked tail. This can be seen in the painting 'Saint Michael Vanquishing the Devil', painted in 1530 by Bonifacio Veronese, picturing a saint defeating a devil with wings and small horn coming out of his head. This changed his image and his personality by making him seem more vindictive and evil.

As the world has grown and evolved, so too has art and the ideas behind it. As new techniques were discovered, the ways of portraying the Gods of ancient mythology has evolved as well, sometimes subtly, in the case of Zeus and Poseidon, and sometimes hugely, like Hades and the underworld. But nothing has remained completely the same from the ancient Greek pot paintings.