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S1v1 β a god of excrescence
Published: 2009-04-28 17:16:11 +0000 UTC; Views: 694; Favourites: 8; Downloads: 0
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Dionysos, the god excessively use of alcoholic drinks, and other obscene excesses i won't mention here, to keep the peace
.beautiful statue of a greek god with an attitude, i tried to make the view of him a bit grimmer and darker. Greek statues try to be as perfect as the human anatomy let's them, so you can say in that kinda way that Dionysos looks perfect here. I tried with shades and work of light to let his personality ooze through the statue.
In my opinion this is one of the most beautiful statues in the ancient epoch. It can be seen in the museum at the archeological site of Olympia.
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something that's rather conspicuous about the statue, is that Dionysus seems to have a lil' baby on it's arm. This baby is nobody less then Amor (aka Cupido). What I've asked myself is, what was the meaning of this? is Amor the ward of Dionysos, and in that case, is love the ward of excesses? i think not
but what did the sculptor mean?
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Comments: 8
Actually, I think it's the other way around.
It's Hermes holding Dionysus on his arm
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lol. You seem to have a strange view of Dionysos. He was never meant to mean excess. Dionysos was meant to represent passion and a human/nature combination. What you see as obscene wasn't ever meant to be seen as such.
Dionysos is a god of epiphany. A god that enlightens through joyous and frenzied life.
If that's not related to love, I don't know what is.
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ow I wouldn't know, that's just what my teacher told my at school, the myths about Dionysus and his alter ego Bacchus, that his followers would eventually tear each other apart in lust etc.
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As far as I know, the norm was more along the lines of them tearing animals apart and having orgies. But back then, that wasn't just acceptable, it was encouraged. Perspective is very important when dealing with history. Most people can only view myths and stories from who they are and the time period they're coming from.
Dionysus was a god who lusted for life and experienced it to it's extremes. He was the rock-star and romance has always followed people who fit in that category... From what I remember, Dionysus and Eros were very close in their relationship and even shared a name with him: Eleutherios.
Myths were created by a people during their time to fill a purpose... We can't view them with a modern slant, it just doesn't work. We must see them from their view and take their purpose in mind.
The image itself is beautiful. I chalk this up to a mixture of great lighting and a pretty good eye in addition to an already gorgeous subject matter. I love classical art and this image is very revealing of the subject.
Thank you for it.
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To understand a civilization's religion, you must truly put your mind where they had theres. Time and societal changes impair our ability to do such... so our view of the past will always be skewed by our view of the present.
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What? No comments? But it's awesome! I hope to see it in a bigger version on the wall of the Latin classroom. If I'm right you were going to do that
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frangias (our latin teacher) has the posters now so they'll be hanging on the wall @ the beginning of the schoolyear.
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