Tomb Of The Diver

While the history of secco fresco dates back to the Egyptian culture, the history of buon fresco paintings can be traced as far back as the Minoan era, 1600 BCE. Buon fresco is a form of painting done on wet plaster surface. The technique allows the color pigments to bind to the wall so the painter needs to work very quickly. During the Minoan and Etruscan era the majority of buon fresco paintings were done in tombs. I will be comparing and contrasting two well-known fresco funerary paintings, Tomb of Hunting and Fishing, 520 BCE and Tomb of the Diver, 480 BCE. These paintings come from two different cultures, however their painting influences are very similar as we are about to see. Like the Egyptians and the Greeks, Etruscans have created
It was made from five slabs of limestone. Two long and two short, the fifth slab is laid on top as the roof. All the slabs were plastered and painted on the interior. The four walls illustrate a banquet scene of a symposium, a social gathering of rich and powerful men in ancient Greece. The men would spend their time together focused on music, poetry, drinking wine, conversation, and love making. Author Steve Tuck describes the Greek painting as if he painted it himself in his book, A History of Roman Art. “One short end shows a young cupbearer and table holding a large wine crater. The other has a young flute-playing girl leading a couple of guests, an older bearded man and younger man. The long walls are filled with elite males reclining on dining couches” (Tuck). As you view the painting you will see three couches on each wall. Two of the couches seat a young man embraced by an older man. It was common to see the concept of male same sex demonstrated by Greek painters. On the third couch you see an older man with a lyre (musical instrument). “The lyre is an important component of the symposium and elite male identity as lyric poetry was sung or recited accompanied by the lyre. A lyre was left in this tomb as one of the very few grave goods. The subject of the wall paintings reinforces the elite status of the tomb’s occupant, certainly a local high status man, by connecting him to Greek male
Tomb of Hunting and Fishing was to portray a combination of elite activities and the natural world. Looking at the painting you can clearly see distinct Greek traits yet we know it was from the Etruscan era with other strong characteristics. The pediment just below the roof is a banquet scene with a loving couple reclining at a meal attended by many loyal servants, musicians, and cupbearers. Tomb of the Diver lacks a pediment as defined within our textbook, Art History by Marilyn Stokstad and Michael W. Cothren. A pediment is, “A triangular gable found over major architectural elements such as Classical Greek porticos, windows, or doors. Formed by and entablature and the end of a sloping roof or a raking cornice.” (Stokstad and Cothren). Within this pediment the man and women are shown with Greek conventions (skin color), the idea of a man and woman dining together is seen as Etruscan conventions. Below the pediment you are able to see the main scene of four men in a boat fishing while dolphins leap out of the water around their boat. The sky above them is filled with many colorful birds flying towards the left side of the painting, probably because there is a man on the right standing on a rock throwing rocks at them with his slingshot. As noted by Tuck, “the birds, boat, and