Ancient Greek vase painter From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Hermonax was a Greekvase painter working in the red-figure style. He painted between c. 470 and 440 BC in Athens. Ten vases signed with the phrase "Hermonax has painted it" survive, mainly stamnoi and lekythoi. He is generally a painter of large pots, though some cups survive.
Hermonax: stamnos G 416, death of Orpheus, Paris, Louvre.
Forming the beginning of the 'early classic' generation of vase-painters, Hermonax was a pupil of the Berlin Painter and a contemporary of the Providence Painter. Sir John Beazley attributed just over 150 vases to his hand. His work has been found all over the ancient Greek world from Marseille to Southern Russia.
Hermonax entered the Berlin Painter's workshop towards its end. As a pupil of the Berlin Painter Hermonax adopted the practice of painting large figural scenes on large vessels. His meander patterns, unlike those of his master, can be careless, as with the Providence Painter. A characteristic of his style is his depiction of the eyes with a concave bottom and a convex top.
The largest share of Hermonax' surviving work depicts Dionysiac themes.
As Beazley states, "Sound and able as Hermonax's work generally is, he only once shows himself a remarkable artist, and that is not on any of his signed vases, but on the Munich stamnos...with the Birth of Erichthonios - Hauser has pointed out what was modern in that vase when it was painted; how the painter rejects the old-fashioned agreements of figure, face, and dress, and turns to a new kind of simplicity and truthfulness: new in his day, and fresh still, because the artist put his own thought, his own feeling into his shapes, and that keeps them alive and green."
As the 'brother' of the Providence Painter, he is seen as less technically proficient.
fragment of a loutrophoros P 15018 • hydria P 25101 • fragment of a stamnos P 25357 • fragment P 25357 A • fragment of a krater P 30017 • fragment of a bell krater P 30019 • fragment of a bowl CP 11948 • fragment of a lekythos P 30065 • fragment of a hydria P 30134 • fragments of a pelike P 8959
pelike CP 10765 • fragment of a pelike CP 10766 • bowl CP 10955 • fragment of a pelike CP 11060 • fragment CP 11061 • fragment of a pelike CP 11064 • fragment of a stamnos CP 11065 • fragment of a stamnos CP 11067 • fragment CP 11068 • fragment of a bowl CP 11944 • fragment of a bowl CP 11945 • fragment of a bowl CP 11946 • fragment of a bowl CP 11947 • fragment of a bowl CP 11948 • fragment of a bowl CP 11949 • fragment of a bowl CP 11950 • fragment of a bowl CP 11951 • fragment of a bowl CP 11952 • fragment of a bowl CP 11953 • fragment of a bowl CP 11954 • bowl G 268 • stamnos G 336 • pelike G 374 • amphora G 376 • stamnos 413 • stamnos G 416 • pelike G 546 • oinochoe G 573
Hanns E. Langenfass: Hermonax. Untersuchungen zur Chronologie. München, Univ., Diss. 1972.
John H. Oakley: Athamas, Ino, Hermes, and the Infant Dionysos. A Hydria by Hermonax. Antike Kunst 25 (1982), p.44-47.
Cornelia Isler-Kerényi: Hermonax in Zürich, 1. Ein Puzzle mit Hermonaxscherben. Antike Kunst 26 (1983), p.127-135.
Cornelia Isler-Kerényi: Hermonax in Zürich, 2. Die Halsamphora Haniel. Antike Kunst 27 (1984), p.54-57.
Cornelia Isler-Kerényi: Hermonax in Zürich, 3. Der Schalenmaler. Antike Kunst 27 (1984), p.154-165.
Cornelia Isler-Kerényi: Hieron und Hermonax. In: Ancient Greek and related pottery. Proceedings of the international vase symposium, Amsterdam 12–15 April 1984 (Amsterdam 1984), p.164.
Cornelia Isler-Kerényi: Hermonax e i suoi temi dionisiaci. In: Images et sociétés en Grèce ancienne. L'iconographie comme méthode d'analyse. Actes du Colloque international, Lausanne 8-11 février 1984 (Lausanne 1987), p.169-175.
