Lysippos (Λύσιππος)[1] was a Greek sculptor of the 4th century BC. Together with Scopas and Praxiteles, he is considered one of the three greatest sculptors of the Classical Greek era, bringing transition into the Hellenistic period. Problems confront the study of Lysippos because of the difficulty of identifying his style amongst the copies which survive. Not only did he have a large workshop and a large number of disciples in his immediate circle,[2] but also there is understood to have been a market for replicas of his work which was supplied also from outside his circle already in his own lifetime and also later in the Hellenistic and Roman periods.[3]
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Lysippos was successor in contemporary repute to the famous sculptor Polykleitos. Among the works attributed to him are the so-called Horses of Saint Mark, Eros Stringing the Bow (of which various copies exist, the best in the British Museum), Agias (known through the marble copy found and preserved in Delphi), the similar Oil Pourer (Dresden and Munich), the Farnese Hercules (which was originally placed in the Baths of Caracalla, although the surviving marble copy lies in the Naples National Archaeological Museum) and Apoxyomenos (or The Scraper, known from a Roman marble copy in the Vatican Museums).
Born at Sicyon around 390 BC Lysippos was a worker in bronze in his youth. He taught himself the art of sculpture, later becoming head of the school of Argos and Sicyon. According to Pliny, he produced more than 1,500 works, all of them in bronze. Commentators noted his grace and elegance, and the symmetria or coherent balance of his figures, which were leaner than the ideal represented by Polykleitos and with proportionately smaller heads, giving them the impression of greater height. He was famous for his attention to the details of eyelids and toenails.
His pupil, Chares of Lindos, constructed the Colossus of Rhodes, one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. As this statue does not exist today, debate continues as to whether its sections were cast in bronze or hammered of sheet bronze.
During his lifetime, Lysippos was personal sculptor to Alexander the Great; indeed, he was the only artist whom the conqueror saw fit to represent him. A recently-discovered epigram of Macedonian Poseidippus, in the anthology represented in the Milan Papyrus, takes as its inspiration a bronze portrait of Alexander:
Lysippus has been credited with the stock representation of an inspired, godlike Alexander with tousled hair and lips parted, looking upward.[4] One fine example, an early Imperial Roman copy found at Tivoli, is conserved at the Louvre.
On 26 February 2010, Greek authorities arrested two men found in illegal possession of various antiquities, including a bronze statue of Alexander, which is possibly a work of Lysippos. If confirmed, this would make it the first original work of Lysippos ever discovered. The statue is currently being examined at the laboratory of the Archaeological Museum of Salonica, which is expected to confirm or deny its authenticity.[5][6]