Vase Painting, Gender, and Social Identity in Archaic Athens (review)

Following his earlier work on narrative in Greek art, Mark Stansbury-O'Donnell shows with his new book that "seeing matters." By looking to the sidelines of heroic struggles and battles, departures and processions, he argues that the presence and characterization of spectators on painted pottery reveals attitudes to social status and gender in sixth-century Athens.

The depiction of flanking figures who watch the action is an Attic phenomenon, dating from 575–550 B.C. to around the end of the sixth century. Stansbury-O'Donnell shows that male spectators are most commonly shown standing quietly, and takes their "inert" mood as a paradigm of modest behavior. Beardless youths are shown in these "inert" postures even more frequently, but they can also be depicted in poses that imitate the action of the heroic protagonist. These "mimetic" poses are taken as alluding to youths' preparation for involvement in adult life. For women the situation is markedly different. Where they are depicted—in battle-scenes, for example—they are found in "reactive" poses (such as gesturing with both hands) much more frequently than men and youths. The presumed tendency of women to lack self-control is a trait noted elsewhere in Greek literature and legislation.

Stansbury-O'Donnell's subject is not every flanking figure, but only those that have no potential to affect the event and little at stake regarding its outcome ("detached" or "pure," in his terminology). Thus, he is not concerned with "invested" spectators—who can affect an event, such as Athena at Herakles' fight with the Nemean lion—or "interested" spectators, such as those watching Theseus slay the Minotaur, whose lives will be saved. One may hesitate here; under Stansbury-O'Donnell's rubric, the unnamed women who flank uninscribed battle scenes are "pure" spectators. Yet in the few cases where they are identified, women in these positions are (divine) mothers and are excluded from the study for being "interested" spectators. In this case, the author's conclusions would be unaffected, but in a book that rightly makes extensive use of percentages and tables, it is necessary to remember that this can be an inexact science.

Engaging with Lacan and the creation of social identity as well as Greek notions of seeing, Stansbury-O'Donnell also examines the role played by seeing—and being seen—on action and behavior from a theoretical standpoint. He discusses a number of vases in terms of their "viewing matrix"; not only how the vase and the figures depicted thereon were looked at, but also how the viewer was looked at by his counterparts in the symposium or ritual setting. The approach is well intended, but does make the viewing experience a rather static event. Furthermore, although Stansbury-O'Donnell does discuss shapes in a earlier chapter, noting a broad shift in the vases that carry spectators—from amphorae and cups to lekythoi in the late sixth century (although this may simply be consequent on the increased production of lekythoi at this time)—greater consideration could be paid to the role of shape in the "viewing matrix." It is curious that the krater does not feature so prominently, given its place at the center of the symposium. Finally, it is not mentioned whether any spectator looks out to the viewer, catching his eye with a frontal face, in the manner of so much later European painting.

Stansbury-O'Donnell also discusses the role of ritual, paying special attention to the role of the chorus as observers and commentators. Noting that the introduction of spectators on vases coincides roughly with the reorganization of the Panathenaic games, he draws a broad connection between the function of a chorus and that of the spectators on vases. In the detailed final chapters, he analyzes the gestures and poses of men, youths, and women. Helpfully, he also explores whether these aspects are dependent on the scene. Most interestingly, women, although "reactive" on the...