GREEK ART OF THE FIFTH AND EARLY FOURTH CENTURIES B.C.:
STAVROS AND DANAË COSTOPOULOS GALLERY
 The Gallery for Greek Art of the Fifth and Early Fourth Centuries B.C. presents the art of Athens during the second half of the fifth century B.C. This was the time in which the Parthenon was being erected on the Athenian Akropolis. The building exerted a palpable influence on contemporary artists in all media. It also was the time in which vase painting attained its most serene and classical expression. The Museum’s collections represent the major artists and, most importantly, convey the innovations that they brought to traditional subjects such as warfare, the life of women, and mythology.
The great master and innovator of the third quarter of the fifth century B.C. was the Achilles Painter. Trained in the red-figure technique by the Berlin Painter, the leading artist of the preceding generation, the Achilles Painter is represented by an important krater as well as by a variety of smaller vases. His greatest innovations can be seen in the funerary lekythoi (oil flasks) that were covered with a white slip, known as white ground, permitting the use of polychromy.
Predominant themes in Athenian art of the second half of the fifth century include the departure for battle and the commemoration of the dead for men, and for women, the rituals connected with marriage. The richness of the Museum’s collection makes it possible to illustrate these subjects in considerable detail and with important examples of the paraphernalia that would have been used at these events.
By the end of the fifth century B.C., as a consequence of the Peloponnesian War (431-404 B.C.), Athens lost her primacy among the Greek states. This political decline is reflected in the art of vase painting more than in sculpture and other media. Subsequent innovations and initiatives emanated from Macedonia, Southern Italy, and other centers of the Greek world.
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