Praxiteles

Sculptor

Born: c. 370 b. c.e.; Athens, Greece Died: c. 330 b. c.e.; place unknown Category: Art and architecture

Life Little is known of the personal life of Praxiteles (prak-SIHT-uhl-eez). He was famous for his art and greatly in demand; the finish of his statues was likened to living flesh. He, along with Scopas of Paros and Lysippus of Sicyon, steered late Classical Greek sculpture in a new direc-

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Praxiteles' Hermes with Infant Dionysus. (© Archivo Iconografico, S. A./Corbis)

Tion, portraying real emotions with realistic, longer, slimmer bodies and smaller heads. These characteristics are evident in the Hermes of Praxiteles, the only intact major original work of these three artists. The expression of the god dangling a bunch of grapes before the infant Dionysus on his arm is light, playful, and relaxed. His weight is shifted so as to thrust a hip outward to create a pleasing S curve. Rather than lean and muscular, the body is soft, almost feminine. Pursuit of the feminine added to Praxiteles’ fame. He was the first to sculpt a nude woman, his famous Aphrodite of Knidos, of which only copies survive.

Influence The new approach to sculpture with which Praxiteles is associated linked the late Classical Age in Greece with the Hellenistic period when Greek art, influenced and modified by other cultures, spread through the classical world.

Further Reading

Barrow, Rosemary. “From Praxiteles to de Chirico: Art and Reception.”

International Journal of the Classical Tradition 11, no. 3 (Winter, 2005): 344-368.

Gardner, Ernest A. Six Greek Sculptors. New York: Ayer, 1977. Havelock, C. M. The Aphrodite of Knidos and Her Successors. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1995.

Nis Petersen

See also: Art and Architecture; Lysippus; Scopas.