Sidney and Lois Eskenazi Museum of Art

About this Work

The red-figure technique migrated to southern Italy along with Greek colonists. Red-figure pottery made in this region during the fourth and third centuries BCE, however, had developed its own distinctive approach. It is characterized by ornate floral forms, female heads as decorative elements, and the extensive use of added color—all of which appear on this krater. Moreover, in this region these large mixing bowls came to be used as funerary monuments, and the scenes on this krater support this function. One side of the vessel illustrates a female and a male mourner bringing commemorative gifts to a stele (gravestone) decorated with black and white ribbons. The other side shows a deceased young man, seated within a shrine in the underworld. He is flanked by attendants; on one side a woman brings an open box and, on the other, a male attendant holds an offering dish.