Lecture on Egyptian Art: Double Portrait, Scribes, and Hatshepsut's Complex

Double Portrait of a Pharaoh and His Wife

• Subjects: Menkaure and Khamerernebty II
• Date: 2490 BCE
• Dimensions: 4 feet tall
• Materials: Diorite (subtractive method)
• Key Features:
  • Carved detail, rigid and frontal pose
  • Marriage pose - her arm behind him and one on his arm
  • Pharaoh's traditional stance with one foot forward
  • Knife blade shin (not realistic)
  • Idealized sculpture, showing eternal youth
  • Pharaoh in linen kilt, wife in one-piece linen garment (chamise)
  • Pharaoh's shaved head and removable beard
  • Holding rods as symbols of power
  • Headdress reflects protective bird pose (pharaoh as protector)
• Archaeological Importance:
  • Found partially excavated; challenge of excavation noted

Limestone Figure of a Scribe

• Date: 2500 BCE
• Material: Limestone (polychrome, painted)
• Dimensions: 2 feet high
• Key Features:
  • Realistic portrayal with flabby chest
  • Intensive, calm, learned expression
  • Representation of a real person (scribe)
  • Literate, highly valued in society
  • Exception to idealized Egyptian sculptures
  • Lifelike colors for vivacity
  • Attention to positive and negative space

Hatshepsut's Mortuary Complex

• Date: 1450 BCE (New Kingdom)
• Architect: Senenmut
• Type: Rock-cut structure
• Features:
  • Carved directly into rock mountainside
  • Formerly a garden environment with pools and fountains
  • Place for elite worship and burial
  • Ramped processional walkways
  • Covered with tourists today
• Hatshepsut:
  • First female pharaoh
  • Regent for underage nephew Thutmose III
  • Dressed like a man in public; wore a fake beard
  • Lover: Senenmut, had a child together
• Sculpture:
  • Kneeling position, carved from granite
  • Youthful and idealized

Hypostyle Hall at Karnak

• Date: 1290s BCE
• Location: Temple of Amun-Ra, Karnak
• Features:
  • Grand scale, post and lintel construction
  • Numerous columns (ten people to circle one)
  • Central columns taller, creating a clerestory
  • Clerestory allows light and air into the structure
  • Clerestory as an architectural innovation

Wall Painting Techniques

• Comparison to Prehistoric Art:
  • Transition from dry fresco to wet fresco
  • Paint absorbed into wet plaster, becomes part of the wall
• Example: Nebamun's Tomb Painting
  • Figures: Twisted perspective, hierarchical scale (Nebamun larger)
  • Activity: Bird hunting
  • Family: Wife, son with lock of youth hairstyle
  • Animals: Realistic depiction of birds and fish
  • Papyrus and Water: Stylized elements
  • Combination: Naturalism in animals and traditional stylized human figures