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Metropolitan Museum Of Art Essay

Decent Essays

This paper compares and contrasts two sculptures, a statue entitled The Royal
Acquaintances Memi and Sabu (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2016b) which depicts two Egyptian important people embracing arm in arm, and the Statue of Gudea (The
Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2016a) which depicts a seated ruler of the ancient
Mesopotamia era, while considering the effect the intended purpose of the sculptures have on their appearances. Ricard (2009) described how “Artists are a product of their culture” (Slide.39), and these two statues are fine examples of how cultural style can be represented in an expression. By working through the form, content and context of both pieces, I will attempt to describe the purpose of each artist’s work.
The Royal Acquaintances …show more content…

Both choices of medium seem to be purposefully chosen by the artists; the choice of color and medium perhaps going hand-in-hand.
Regarding composition, while the SG sculpture is a solid, seated, one-level piece, the
RAMS sculpture is an unbalanced, asymmetrical one, showing the significant difference in height between the male and female figures.
The primary content of both represent real-life features, such as RAMS’ loving couple, their embrace, and their smiles, and SG’s focal hat, prominent, powerful-looking ruler, seated position and his bare feet. Furthermore, SG’s secondary meaning behind the content could be the gesture of clasping hands, perhaps showing a conventional significance in the artist’s Neo-Sumerian culture when a ruler goes before his subjects, whereas RAMS’ couple might depict a husband and wife of high social status, which was typical for many Egyptian artifacts.
Finally, both sculptures have script etched into their medium; SG’s on the robe, expressing Gudea’s restored great temples, and RAMS’ names in Hieroglyph, on

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