To What Extent Was Kritios A Revolutionary Sculptor?

To what extent do you think Kritios was a revolutionary sculptor?

Kritios was an Athenian sculptor, whose style and technique during the late archaic period helped revolutionize the archaic period into the Classical period. He has two main statutes that I am going to examine the first of which being the Kritios boy. Also referred to as “the first beautiful nude art” it is very important as it is a precursor to the later classical sculptures. It depicts a young boy in an idea form (so sculpted in the nude if they where in the ideal form) and is possibly a reflection of the Athenian cultural obsession with Pederasty. Yet it is more important in the sense that it smashes the Korous pose. The Kritios boy is so important as Kritios has mastered a complete understanding of how the different parts of the body act together, the statue supports the weight on the left leg meaning that the right one is bent at the knee and relaxed, and forces a chain of events as the pelvis is pushed diagonally upwards on the left side this causes the right buttock to relax and the spine to be placed in an “S” shaped curve causing
this stance is referred to as contrapposto, and the Kritios boy is one of the earliest examples of it mastered. (One of the greatest examples of contrapposto in history was during the neoclassical period ‘David” by Michelangelo, 1504) but this could not have been achieved without Kritios. The kritios boy also shows a number of other innovations that distinguish it from any of the Archaic Kouroi or anything from the Archaic period. The muscular and skeletal structure are depicted with an unforced life-like accuracy as well as