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September 30, 2008
The creepiest thing in the Greek Rooms
Aren't these odd? This is a detached pair of eyes, probably Greek 5th Century, for insertion into a statue. Remember that the Greeks painted marble and wood statues to look more naturalistic (they probably polished bronze to look like tanned flesh), added color effects like gilding to hair, and preferred naturalistic eyes. So this pair fell out of something - maybe the wooden head rotted, or the bronze head was broken up and melted.
Mounted this way they are intensely creepy. Yes, they're staring right at me.
Link to the Met page about them.
Click on them to go to my Flickr stream - the side view changes things!
Posted by CrankyProfessor at September 30, 2008 8:59 AM