The Pitsa panels
I’ve always loved looking at very old art styles. So today, we head back to sixth century Greece.
This panel painting is one of the famed Pitsa panels. Relative dating methods using stylistic features dates this panel to circa 540 to 530 BC during the Archaic Greek period. The name of the artist is unknown.
The Pitsa panels are a group of four panels that were found in a cave in Pitsa, Corinthia, Greece during the 1930s. They are the earliest Greek panel paintings known to date, and the only surviving panels still in existence from the Archaic Greek period. Panel paintings were one of the more respected forms of art in Ancient Greece and have a long history.
This painting consists of a thin wooden panel which was first covered in plaster, then painted. The artist used mineral pigments to create eight different colors. This type of material does not typically survive archaeologically. Luckily for us, the environment in the cave helped to keep the wood and paint intact until they were recovered. This really was quite a rare and wonderful discovery.
This painting is a votive offering to the Cult of the Nymphs. The scene on this panel depicts a sheep being led to slaughter as a religious sacrifice to the nymphs. The nymphs are minor nature women deities. An inscription at the top of the piece written in the Corinthian alphabet dedicates the panel to the nymphs. The Cult of the Nymphs was a part of both the Orphic and Dionysian Greek religions.
The Pitsa panels are currently on display at the National Archaeological Museum in Athens, Greece.
For more Folk and Traditional art, please visit the art movements page here.
You can also find more artists to learn about here.
