Kenneth Lapatin
Biographic Data
| ID | 5375944 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Kenneth Lapatin |
| GIVEN NAMES | Kenneth |
| FAMILY NAME | Lapatin |
| SIGNATURE | LAPATIN K |
| AFFILIATIONS | Department of Antiquities, The J. Paul Getty Museum, 1200 Getty Center Drive, Suite 1000v, Los Angeles, CA, USA |
| VERIFIED | No |
| TOTAL WORKS | 16 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 20 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 15 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 1 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1996 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
The Getty Peacock Fresco
Acquired by J. Paul Getty himself in 1968, the Getty Museum’s fragment of a fresco depicting a peacock (68.AG.13) has long been a favorite among visitors. Hitherto considered to be an ancient Roman work produced in Campania circa 70 CE, it has been reproduced as museum merchandise, textbook illustrations, and gift-shop decor. Recent technical examination and analyses combined with historical research, however, reveal that the popular peacock is n…
The Drunken Satyr from the Villa dei Papiri at Herculaneum
Prior to the international loan exhibition Buried by Vesuvius: Treasures from the Villa dei Papiri at the Getty Villa in Los Angeles (26 June – 28 October 2019), the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli (MANN) generously lent the ancient bronze statue of a Drunken Satyr for study, analysis, and conservation. Discovered in pieces in tunnels excavated through what has come to be recognized in the outer peristyle garden of the Villa dei Papiri at …
The Getty Gnaios
An amethyst intaglio depicting the Roman general Mark Antony and inscribed ‘Gnaios’ has been much lauded and frequently illustrated over the past fifty years. Other gems signed by this ancient engraver have been prized, replicated and forged for centuries. This article traces the amethyst, previously in the Ionides collection and acquired by the J. Paul Getty Museum in 2001, to the possession of Prince Stanislas Poniatowski, and demonstrates that…
All That Glisters
Artistry in Bronze
New Statues for Old Gods
The "Art" of Politics
Appreciation of so-called "works of art" in antiquity was based on more than art-historical factors. Many were potent symbols of civic, religious, and cultural identity. Thus their movements rarely went unnoticed. Greek and Latin authors record over 50 examples of the restitution of previously confiscated artifacts, including some of the most famous artworks of classical antiquity. These were returned to their original owners for diverse reasons—…
Art of the Classical World in the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Reviewed by: Art of the Classical World in the Metropolitan Museum of Art: Greece, Cyprus, Etruria, Rome Kenneth Lapatin Elizabeth J. Milleker. Art of the Classical World in the Metropolitan Museum of Art: Greece, Cyprus, Etruria, Rome. Published by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; distributed by Yale University Press: New Haven, 2007. Pp. xi, 508. $75.00 (hb.). ISBN 978-0-300-12031-8 (Yale), 978-158839-217-6 (MMA); $40.00 (pb.) ISBN 978…
Picturing Socrates
The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Pericles
Mid-fifth-century Athens saw the development of the Athenian empire, the radicalization of Athenian democracy through the empowerment of poorer citizens, the adornment of the city through a massive and expensive building program, the classical age of Athenian tragedy, the assembly of intellectuals offering novel approaches to philosophical and scientific issues, and the end of the Spartan-Athenian alliance against Persia and the beginning of open…
Athenian Vase Construction
Greek vases are one of the world's finest ceramic traditions. Even before a vase became a painted masterpiece, its graceful lines and elegant proportions made it a masterpiece of form. This highly regarded volume details in a comprehensive, step-by-step fashion the manner in which the major Athenian vases were made. Photographs of pottery from the Getty Museum and other collections provide ancient evidence from the interiors and exteriors of the …
The Palaikastro Kouros
Journeys of an Icon
The traditional account of the delivery of the gold and ivory Minoan Snake Goddess to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, by a Cretan immigrant, formerly a workman at Knossos, is a fabrication. Previously unpublished documents reveal that two American archaeologists with close ties to the Museum were directly involved in transporting the statuette, in June 1914. Neither was interested in personal profit; rather, they acted as middlemen, apparently f…
The Furniture of Western Asia, Ancient and Traditional
Pheidias ἐλεφαντουργός
In this paper the author examines the philological and archaeological evidence that techniques of softening ivory and manipulating its shape were employed by Pheidias and his successors in the production of monumental chryselephantine statues. Prior to the Classical period, gold and ivory images appear to have been constructed of individually carved ivory faces and limbs attached to bodies fashioned of wood and subsequently gilded. The colossal s…
Attic Document Reliefs
The "Art" of Politics
Appreciation of so-called "works of art" in antiquity was based on more than art-historical factors. Many were potent symbols of civic, religious, and cultural identity. Thus their movements rarely went unnoticed. Greek and Latin authors record over 50 examples of the restitution of previously confiscated artifacts, including some of the most famous artworks of classical antiquity. These were returned to their original owners for diverse reasons—…
Athenian Vase Construction
Greek vases are one of the world's finest ceramic traditions. Even before a vase became a painted masterpiece, its graceful lines and elegant proportions made it a masterpiece of form. This highly regarded volume details in a comprehensive, step-by-step fashion the manner in which the major Athenian vases were made. Photographs of pottery from the Getty Museum and other collections provide ancient evidence from the interiors and exteriors of the …
Journeys of an Icon
The traditional account of the delivery of the gold and ivory Minoan Snake Goddess to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, by a Cretan immigrant, formerly a workman at Knossos, is a fabrication. Previously unpublished documents reveal that two American archaeologists with close ties to the Museum were directly involved in transporting the statuette, in June 1914. Neither was interested in personal profit; rather, they acted as middlemen, apparently f…
Attic Document Reliefs
Pheidias ἐλεφαντουργός
In this paper the author examines the philological and archaeological evidence that techniques of softening ivory and manipulating its shape were employed by Pheidias and his successors in the production of monumental chryselephantine statues. Prior to the Classical period, gold and ivory images appear to have been constructed of individually carved ivory faces and limbs attached to bodies fashioned of wood and subsequently gilded. The colossal s…
The Furniture of Western Asia, Ancient and Traditional
Journeys of an Icon
The traditional account of the delivery of the gold and ivory Minoan Snake Goddess to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, by a Cretan immigrant, formerly a workman at Knossos, is a fabrication. Previously unpublished documents reveal that two American archaeologists with close ties to the Museum were directly involved in transporting the statuette, in June 1914. Neither was interested in personal profit; rather, they acted as middlemen, apparently f…
The Palaikastro Kouros
Athenian Vase Construction
Greek vases are one of the world's finest ceramic traditions. Even before a vase became a painted masterpiece, its graceful lines and elegant proportions made it a masterpiece of form. This highly regarded volume details in a comprehensive, step-by-step fashion the manner in which the major Athenian vases were made. Photographs of pottery from the Getty Museum and other collections provide ancient evidence from the interiors and exteriors of the …
Picturing Socrates
The Cambridge Companion to the Age of Pericles
Mid-fifth-century Athens saw the development of the Athenian empire, the radicalization of Athenian democracy through the empowerment of poorer citizens, the adornment of the city through a massive and expensive building program, the classical age of Athenian tragedy, the assembly of intellectuals offering novel approaches to philosophical and scientific issues, and the end of the Spartan-Athenian alliance against Persia and the beginning of open…
Art of the Classical World in the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Reviewed by: Art of the Classical World in the Metropolitan Museum of Art: Greece, Cyprus, Etruria, Rome Kenneth Lapatin Elizabeth J. Milleker. Art of the Classical World in the Metropolitan Museum of Art: Greece, Cyprus, Etruria, Rome. Published by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; distributed by Yale University Press: New Haven, 2007. Pp. xi, 508. $75.00 (hb.). ISBN 978-0-300-12031-8 (Yale), 978-158839-217-6 (MMA); $40.00 (pb.) ISBN 978…
New Statues for Old Gods
The "Art" of Politics
Appreciation of so-called "works of art" in antiquity was based on more than art-historical factors. Many were potent symbols of civic, religious, and cultural identity. Thus their movements rarely went unnoticed. Greek and Latin authors record over 50 examples of the restitution of previously confiscated artifacts, including some of the most famous artworks of classical antiquity. These were returned to their original owners for diverse reasons—…
Artistry in Bronze
All That Glisters
The Getty Gnaios
An amethyst intaglio depicting the Roman general Mark Antony and inscribed ‘Gnaios’ has been much lauded and frequently illustrated over the past fifty years. Other gems signed by this ancient engraver have been prized, replicated and forged for centuries. This article traces the amethyst, previously in the Ionides collection and acquired by the J. Paul Getty Museum in 2001, to the possession of Prince Stanislas Poniatowski, and demonstrates that…
The Drunken Satyr from the Villa dei Papiri at Herculaneum
Prior to the international loan exhibition Buried by Vesuvius: Treasures from the Villa dei Papiri at the Getty Villa in Los Angeles (26 June – 28 October 2019), the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli (MANN) generously lent the ancient bronze statue of a Drunken Satyr for study, analysis, and conservation. Discovered in pieces in tunnels excavated through what has come to be recognized in the outer peristyle garden of the Villa dei Papiri at …
The Getty Peacock Fresco
Acquired by J. Paul Getty himself in 1968, the Getty Museum’s fragment of a fresco depicting a peacock (68.AG.13) has long been a favorite among visitors. Hitherto considered to be an ancient Roman work produced in Campania circa 70 CE, it has been reproduced as museum merchandise, textbook illustrations, and gift-shop decor. Recent technical examination and analyses combined with historical research, however, reveal that the popular peacock is n…
Art (12 works) · Classical Antiquity Studies (10 works) · History (10 works) · Ancient history (6 works) · Archaeology (6 works) · Ancient Mediterranean Archaeology and History (5 works) · Art history (5 works) · History (5 works) · Classics (4 works) · Archaeological Research and Protection (3 works)