Oltos

Oltos
Residence	Athens
Occupation	Vase painter
Years active	c.525 BC to c. 500 BC
Style	Initially bilingual, later red-figure

Athena and Enkelados in combat, red-figure plate, Louvre CA 3662.

Oltos was a Late Archaic Greek vase painter, active in Athens. From the time between 525 BC and 500 BC, about 150 works by him are known. Two pieces, a cup in Berlin (Antikensammlung F 2264) and a cup in Tarquinia (Museo Nazionale Tarquiniese RC 6848), are signed by him as painter.

Oltos is thought to have begun his career in the workshop of the potter Nikosthenes. Initially, he mainly painted bilingual vases or bowls with interior black-figure and exterior red-figure decoration. His black-figure style was influenced by Psiax and the Antimenes Painter. No pure black-figure works by Oltos are yet known. His tondos usually depict a single figure. They are often full of tension, frequently with differential directions of gaze and movement. Later, he exclusively painted red-figure, influenced especially by the Andokides Painter as well as several members of the Pioneer Group, especially his former pupil Euphronios.

His drawing style was spacious and elegant, but never reached the depth of detail of his most important contemporary masters. He had a distinctive tendency towards luxurious ornamentation and symmetric compositions. In the middle of his career he concentrated especially on the depiction of mythological scenes. Over time, he worked with several different potters. We know of at least six: Hischylos, most importantly Pamphaios, with whom he created the earliest known stamnos, Tleson, Chelis, and finally Kachrylion, for whom he worked together with Euphronios, as well as Euxitheos.

An innovation introduced by Oltos is found on an amphora at London (British Museum E 259). Here, he depicts a single figure, with no frame or floor line.

Selected works

Dionysos, interior image from a bilingual cup (A), Munich, Staatliche Antikensammlungen (Inv. 2593).

Eurystheus hiding in a jar as Herakles brings him the Erymanthian boar. Side A from a red-figure kylix by Oltos, ca. 510 BC, Paris, Louvre (G17).

Altenburg, Staatliches Lindenau-Museum – bowl 224
Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Museum – fragment of a kylix AIA B1
Basel, Antikensammlung and Sammlung Ludwig – bowl BS 459
Berlin, Antikensammlung – bowl F 2263 • bowl F 2264 • phiale F 2310 • bowl F 4220 • bowl F 4221
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts – kylix 13.83 • fragment of a kylix 08.31d • fragment 10.219
Bowdoin, Bowdoin College Museum of Art – fragment of a kylix 1913.14
Chicago, University of Chicago (David and Alfred Smart Gallery) – kylix 1967.115
Fayetteville, The University Museum – kylix 56.25.15
London, The British Museum – kylix E 41 • amphora E 258 • stamnos E 437
Malibu, J. Paul Getty Museum – kylix 86.AE.276 • kylix 86.AE.277
Mount Holyoke, Mount Holyoke College Art Museum – kylix 1967.BS.II.11
Munich, Staatliche Antikensammlungen – bowl 25 93 • bowl 2618
New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art – psykter 1989.281.69
Paris, Musée National du Louvre – fragment CA 3662 • amphora G 2 • amphora G 3
Tarquinia, Museo Nazionale Tarquiniese – bowl RC 6848
Vatican, Museo Gregoriano Etrusco Vaticano – bowl 498
Parma, Museo Archeologico Nazionale – kylix (520-510 b.C)

Bibliography

Joachim Harnecker: Oltos. Untersuchungen zu Themenwahl und Stil eines früh-rotfigurigen Schalenmalers, Lang, Frankfurt a. M. u. a. 1992, ISBN 3-631-43755-2

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Oltos.

Pottery of ancient Greece

Wine vessel shapes	Dinos Kotyle Krater Kyathos Psykter Rhyton Skyphos

Tableware	Eye-cup Kantharos Kylix Oenochoe Olpe Patera Pinakion

Perfume, oil, and wedding shapes	Alabastron Aryballos Askos Lebes Gamikos Lekythos Loutrophoros Lydion Pyxis Stirrup jar

Funerary shapes and cultic shapes	Kernos Lekythos Loutrophoros Phiale

Storage shapes	Amphora Hydria Kalathos Kalpis Lebes Pelike Pithos Stamnos

Utilitarian ceramics	Chuta Epinetron Luchnos Situla

Techniques	Bilingual pottery Black-figure Bucchero Red-figure Six's technique Three-phase firing White-ground

Styles	Ancient Greek vase-painting styles

Potters and painters	List of Greek potters List of Greek vase painters List of Little Masters Name vase

Museums noted for pottery	Athens Basel und Ludwig Berlin Bodrum British Edinburgh Getty Heraklion Louvre Thera Ure Vatican Walters

Writers and books	Adolf Furtwängler Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum Dietrich von Bothmer Edmond Pottier John Beazley John Boardman Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae

Special topics in Greek pottery	Frying pans Kalos inscription Nikosthenic amphora Panathenaic amphora Symposium Typology