Abundance of Life: Etruscan Wall Painting (Getty Trust Publications: J. Paul Getty Museum) (Hardcover)

~ Stephan Steingraber (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The pictures are amazing. It's too bad about the text. Not that archeologist Steingräber doesn't provide a thorough, if stodgily academic, tour of Etruscan wall painting in this large-scale art book. His smooth, jargon-free account of what he calls "the first chapter in the history of Italian painting," dating from the seventh to the second centuries B.C., will be accessible to anyone with a grasp of the basic outlines of ancient history. The problem is that it's so difficult to connect what Steingräber says with the pictures in the book. The images are not numbered, making it nearly impossible to track down any painting Steingräber mentions, or even to know if the painting is reproduced in the book at all. But the pictures are stunning. Masterfully photographed paintings on Etruscan tomb walls inventively depict birds, dancers, divers and scenes of the afterlife in loose, free-flowing lines. Especially gorgeous are the ones printed on heavy, textured "Tintoretto" paper that imparts something of the painting's original stone surfaces. Full-page closeups of unexpected details—a boy gazing at a bird in his hand, the curious expressions on the faces of a three-headed serpent—bring an entire world to life and allow it to tell its own story. (Nov. 13)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Product Description

Since ancient Greek monumental painting has virtually disappeared, Etruscan wall paintings offer the most important examples of pre-Roman painting in the West. Only the frescoes of Pompeii are comparable in quantity, and as at Pompeii, Etruscan paintings can still be found in their original locations, in the house-shaped tombs of the rich at a handful of sites in what is now northern and central Italy.
A companion title to Domus: Wall Painting in the Roman House, this book traces the stylistic and iconographic evolution of Etruscan wall paintings over the span of five hundred years and analyzes what they reveal about Etruscan daily life, religion, and funerary rites. The earliest paintings, with their colorful scenes of banquets, hunts, and athletic games, gave way, in the later tombs, to scenes that are darker in both color and content. Here Etruscan demons escort the dead on their perilous journey to Hades, while complex genealogies and magisterial insignia signify the assertion of political and social status.
The striking paintings in these "underground museums," beautifully reproduced on special paper that evokes the texture of the ancient walls, make it clear why the Etruscans have excited the imaginations of scholars and poets for centuries.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 320 pages
• Publisher: Getty Publications (November 13, 2006)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0892368659
• ISBN-13: 978-0892368655
• Product Dimensions: 13.1 x 10.8 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 5.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #455,990 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic in every way, April 4, 2009

By	J. Radakovich "countrad" (USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Once again the Getty Museum has produced a treasure in the form of a perfect book. This time with the mysterious and sublime art of the Etruscans. One gets an incredibly accurate feel for the layout of the tombs in which the frescoes are to be found by means of countless color reproductions and diagrams. This book would be a bargain at twice the price given the quality of the paper, binding and format.
This is the ideal companion to Domus, their treatment of Roman wall painting.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful book, September 30, 2007

By	S. Costello - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I agree with the Publisher's Weekly review above... the text is interesting and informative, though consevative to say the least. But it's true that to find out anything about a particular tomb, you have to use the index, and follow each page entry for text and images. It's very tedious. I think it would be more helpful to have the thematic text followed by catalogue entries for each tomb.