Ancient Art Week!
Various Mummy Portraits
Roman Egypt (Fayum; Saqqara) , c. 0-200 C.E.
Encaustic on panel; various.
The Oldest Modernist Paintings (SmithsonianMag.com):
The images seem to allow us to gaze directly into the ancient world. “The Fayum portraits have an almost disturbing lifelike quality and intensity,” says Euphrosyne Doxiadis, an artist who lives in Athens and Paris and is the author of The Mysterious Fayum Portraits. “The illusion, when standing in front of them, is that of coming face to face with someone one has to answer to—someone real.”