Many people don't realize that the ancient statues that seem to be made of gray stone and dull tones originally were painted. Thier color wore off over time.
Chroma: Ancient Sculpture in Color at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, explored the way statues used to be in ancient times and offered many reconstructed versions to give viewers a sense of the original antiquities. There were a few goddesses, including a gorgeous reconstructed Athena statue and a beautiful rendition of the ancient and mysterious Sphinx, which has goddess status in the eyes of many.
It was interesting, colorful, and also a bit invigorating to see recreations of such ancient works of art in living color.
Several statues of reconstructed deities or humans were scattered throughout the large Greek and Roman areas of the Met, and the rest are relegated to room 172 on the Mezzanine during the exhibit. There was a fascinating video that explained how all the ancient statues found over the years began in color, and the colors faded (and the video is still available for view on the Te Met website). It is believed the colors bring the statues/deities alive.
The reconstructed statues in the exhibit were all quite striking. The females all look like Goddesses but some were recreations of statues of humans or funerary statues.
The museum website explains the exhibit this way: "Ancient Greek and Roman sculptures were once colorful, vibrantly painted, and richly adorned with detailed ornamentation. Chroma: Ancient Sculpture in Color reveals the colorful backstory of polychromy — meaning "many colors," in Greek — and presents new discoveries of surviving ancient colors on artworks in The Met's world-class collection. Exploring the practices and materials used in ancient polychromy, the exhibition highlights cutting-edge scientific methods used to identify the ancient color. It examines how color helped convey meaning in antiquity, and how ancient polychromy has been viewed and understood in later periods."
"The exhibition features a series of reconstructions of ancient sculptures in color by Prof. Dr. V. Brinkmann, Head of the Department of Antiquity at the Liebieghaus Skulpturensammlung, and Dr. U. Koch-Brinkmann, and introduces a new reconstruction of The Met's Archaic-period Sphinx finial, completed by The Liebieghaus team in collaboration with The Met. Presented alongside original Greek and Roman works representing similar subjects, the reconstructions are the result of a wide array of analytical techniques, including 3D imaging and rigorous art historical research. Polychromy is a significant area of study for The Met, and the Museum has a long history of investigating, preserving, and presenting manifestations of the original color on ancient statuary."
- Laurie Sue Brockway