María Amor Martínez

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YEAR 1

DESCRIBE THE CONVENTIONS OF REPRESENTATION USED IN

EGYPTIAN TWO DIMENSIONAL ART. DEMONSTRATE THIS WITH

REFERENCE TO THE WALL SCENES IN ONE NON-ROYAL TOMB OF

THE LATER OLD KINGDOM

2501 words

I hereby declare that the materials contained in this essay are entirely the product of my

own work, that sources used are fully documented and that the whole has not been

previously submitted for any other purpose.

Egyptian two dimensional arts are intended to be a timeless representation of life. Every

single figure is full of meaning and the whole representation must to be read as a magic

book able to revive magically and eternally the scene represented. Life is a succession

of moments, it develops itself by an infinity number of particularities but the Egyptian

art so close to the life, intends to be universal; every particular moment of life whenever

is represented according with certain rules, become universal, so archetypal, and thus

absolutely truth. Magic reality is more real even that objective reality because is real in

more than one plane due to the strong conceptualization (thus abstraction) (Tiradritti p.

9) and, consequently, is full of potential energy. That is why certain representations

have been meticulously erased in order to defeat its power.

The conventions of the Egyptian two-dimensional art acquired a distinctive character

around the beginning of the Dynastic Period and despite the various changes and

development that occurred, it remains to our eyes unmistakably Egyptian throughout

pharaonic times (Robins1986, p.11). The basic plastic element in Egyptian Art is the

contour (Sureda p.190).

Many of the painted tombs from the Memphis necropolis have a dark background color

that encompasses a chromatic territory which ranges from indefinite black to bluish

gray. These gradations are used to create a neutral outline around the figures (Tiradritti,

2008, p. 120) Pliny (pp. 228-229) stated that the Egyptians created the drawing

following the contours (by charcoal) of a man's shadow cast. Every single object has its

own convention: some shall be drew on profile, some in front view, always depending

on which gave the more instantly recognizable shape for the type of object concerned

(Robins 1986, p. 11).

Before the decoration of the monument, the walls were prepared by polishing to a

smooth surface patching any flaw in the stone with plaster to provide a smooth surface

for the carving of the relief. Once the surface was prepared, whether for relief nor

painting, the areas which were to contain scenes were marked out with red lines and,

from at least the Middle Kingdom onwards, all or some of these were covered with a

squares grid used to obtain the correct proportions of figures. As the work was

completed, the grid lines were either destroyed (when carved) nor covered with paint

(when painted) (Robins 1986, p.20).

Two main kinds of relief were employed: raised and sunk. In the first the background is

cut away from the scene leaving the figures standing out from the surface of the stone,

in the last the surface of the figures is cut away below the background level. In both

cases details can then be cut within the figures, which can also be modeled. The sharp

shadows engendered by sunken relief make it particularly suitable for use in bright

sunlight, which tends to flatten the contours of raised relief. Conventionally, raised

relief was used inside buildings and sunk relief outside (Robins 1986, p.22).

Nowadays we are used to considering relief as a genre of their own between painting

and sculpture, but we can still see today from the fact that even the highest relief is

accommodated between the original surface of a block and its own base level, just as in

a painting the frontmost part and the painted surface are the same, that the origin of

relief is very close to that of the drawing and painting. In fact both have in common that

they belong to two-dimensional as opposed to three-dimensional representations.

(Schäfer, p.73).

The distinctive conventions of Egyptian art have been referred to as ‘conceptual’ rather

than ‘perceptual’ (Teeter p.16). The animal and objects of the daily life have its

particular way of representation as sacred letters; but, particularly, the human figure

(when belonging to the owner of the monument) has a special canon considering each

part as if were independent and drawn it in their most peculiar and typical way.

In the Old Kingdom the grid system were formed in the whole by 19 horizontals lines

and 18 from the baseline to the hairline, from this must have developed out the guide

line system. The old vertical axial guide became incorporated as a vertical guide line.

(Robins 1994, p. 76). This procedure rendered uniform figures long-legged and high-

waisted very typical. In the eighth century B.C., the system was expanded to twenty-one

units, resulting in even more elongated figures (Teeter, p.16).

To illustrate every point the author is going to use the scenes from the tomb of

Kagemni, a Chief Justice and Vizier of the king Teti of the VI Dynasty (c. 2321-2290).

All the diagrams are drawing by the author based upon the information after Harpur and

Tiradritti.

The Kagemni´s tomb is located at Saqqara, to the north of the pyramid of Pharaoh Teti,

and to the northeast of the step pyramid of Djoser. It testifies to the power reached by

the highest commissioners at the time where the decline of royal authority began. The

tomb is a mastaba type with 32 m. long sides. This solid structure is L shaped and

enclosed several chambers (fig. 1). The southern arm of the L (along the entry axis) is

oriented east west, the other arm is south-north (www.osirisnet.net p.1 2/04/10).

Fig. 1

The entry is located at the south end of the east facing façade. Two figures, Kagemni

and his counterpart, are presented on the doorpost carving in a sunken relief that permit

a very interesting effect of the shadows casting from the sunlight.

The chambers are organized in a way that permit shifting from the very naturalistic

scenes near the entrance (Room I, II and III) to the most ritual ones as approaching the

funeral chamber.

In the South wall of the Room VI is a very impressive image of the vizier wearing a

leopard skin, fig 2.

Fig. 2

As we can see, the proportions are very similar to those of the later kingdom so there is

little difficulty in inferring that it was an earlier grid system although not always

preserved.

The vizier figure is show in a classic way: the head was shown in profile, into which

were set at the appropriate place a full-view eye and eyebrow and a half mouth. The

shoulders were shown full width from the front, but the boundary line on the forward

side of the body from armpit to waist, including the nipple, was in profile, as were the

waist, elbows, legs and feet. It was traditional to show both feet from the inside with a

single toe and an arch. Whatever lay behind the foot might be seen through the gap of

the arch. (Robins 1986, pp. 12-14).

The clenched hand, are showed in full view: the rear from the back showing the nails

and the forward showing the knuckle (fig 3a). In all his standing figures, Kagemni is

showed clenching the power´s insignia: the staff in his left hand and the sekhem sceptre

in his right hand, sometimes are facing right (Fig. 2) and sometimes facing left (Fig 3a).

Fig .3

In the West wall of the Room IV (frontispiece) is a figure of Kagemni with a classical

lasso on the hair (fig 3a) It is interesting to note that when the figure is reversed to face

left, logically the left arm carrying the staff should become the rear arm and the right

arm with the scepter the forward one. With such an arrangement, the scepter would stick

out in advance of the body, while the staff held in the rear arm would not only run

unattractively close to the body an threaten to obscure the face but would also cross the

horizontal line of the scepter, making an ugly and confusing image (Robins 1986, p. 15)

(Fig.3b). The artist has solved the problem by attaching a left hand to the right arm and

vice versa. (Robins 1986 p. 16) (Fig.3a)

Fig. 4

Sometimes, such figures were complete reversals of right-facing ones. In Fig. 4 the

figure of Kagemni in Room V, South wall is less expertly carved than others

(Harpus&Scremin 2004, p187) the proportions are not respected and the figure is just

the reversals of the right position because if it is interpreted in real terms, the staff and

scepter appear in the wrong hands: the staff on the right hand and the scepter on the left

and it is overlapping the kilt.

In the façade of the mastaba, there are two standing images of Kagemni, (Fig 5) one

facing right and the other facing left, both of them are composed according to the canon

having the scepter and the staff on the correct position.

Fig. 5

A system of scale was used to encode the relative importance of the figures. The larger

a figure, the greater its importance so that in tombs the figure of the owner may

overlook scenes in four or five register and is also shown larger than the members of his

family ( Robins 1986, p. 19).

Fig. 6

The relief of Fig 6 is placed above of the doorway of the room IV towards room VI.

Kagemni is seated on a sedan-chair holding a staff in the left hand and leaning

comfortably on his right arm. It is a very unconventional position but the rules are

present in the relation between the size and relative importance of the characters, ‘y’ the

son of Kagemni standing by his back, has the same size than the twenty bearers and

foremen.

Objects are usually shown in their characteristic or most visually satisfying aspect, two

dimensionally on the flat drawing surface, without depth. Rectangular objects would be

represented in full view from the front or side depending on which gave the more

instantly recognizable shape for the type of object concerned.

If the contents of a container were important, they were drawn above it, although they

were inside. That is displayed in the scene of the North wall of the Room VIII, where a

counterpoise and collar are over a chest (Fig 7). Furniture was also normally represented

in profile, so that chairs and stools appear only two legs and no depth (Robins 1986, p.

11).

.

Fig. 7

If, for one reason or another, more than one surface of a subject seems important, the

draughtsman can do one of two things. He can separate the two with lines, or join one to

the other without a dividing mark.

The minor figures could be represented in a wide range of activities and their body

could be less than perfect. The conventions here are less strict. The most noticeable

difference in the delineation of the body between static major figures and more active

minor figures lies in the shoulder region. Instead of the usual full view the shoulders

may be treated in several different ways in order to express different gestures and

movement of the arms. (Robins 1986, p. 38). One method is where the two shoulders

appears to be folder either forward or backward along the central axis of the body.

Although not corresponding with reality the device enabled artists to illustrate a wide

variety of activities and posture in a readily understandable way.

A second way was to continue to show the far or forward shoulder in full view while the

near or rear shoulder was drawn in profile allowing the arm to appear in a whole range

of positions. For certain postures a complete profile view of the shoulders was

developed. In the best art it is astonishing how most of these minor figures are

successful in terms of expressiveness even when their postures cannot be translated

directly into real terms. (Robins 1986, p.39).

Fig. 8

This relief (Fig. 8) is at North wall, Room III, there is a herdsman strengthening his

control of a rope wound tightly around the legs of a cow while a milkman fulfills a

container with milk. The herdsman is folding his right shoulder and the milkman his

left. Although the position of the body is unreal the general impression is very realistic.

All the feet and paws in the scene are on the baseline, even if the figures are overlapped

on the drawing surface (Robins 1994 p. 6) as happens with the milkman and the cow.

Curiously the left foot of the herdsman is partially hidden by the later cow´s hoof

featuring a kind of deepness.

Fig. 9

On the north wall in Room IV of the tomb is featured a scene of bird-trapping

developed in two plains. Depth is indicated by the overlapping of figures, but there is no

attempt to render the illusion of the third dimension on the two-dimensional drawing

surface; all the figures, the overlapping and the overlapped, stand up on the same

baseline as if drawn to it by a magnet and further ones are of course, not reducing by

perspective (Schäfer, p.179).

Figures are shown from the side (in elevation), but the clap net in its marshy pond is

shown from above (in plan), although the birds and plants within it are drawn in profile.

Thus two distinct views are combined in the same picture plane (Robins 2008, p.23).

In the west wall of the Room I is depicted a frog and butterfly cramping together under

the bow of Kagemi´s boat (fig. 10)

Fig. 10

The conventions are used by depicting the frog from the side and the butterfly from

above. (Fig 10)

From the Early Dynastic Period, artist began to divide the drawing surface into

horizontal registers placed vertically above one another. Although scenes are often

loosely linked by theme or location either horizontally within a register or in different

registers in sequences up and down the wall, the same basic set of scenes may exist in

different versions which arrange individual scenes in varying order, making it plain that

their position on the wall and the placing of one scene in relation to another does not

itself give information about the order in which to read them (Robins 1986, p. 18). The

tomb´s owner, normally, is overlooking four or five registers.

Fig. 11

This relief (fig 11) is on the west side of the Room IV. In order to organize the

material on the drawing surface, the artist divided the area into horizontal registers

placed vertically above one another. The surface itself was neutral, nor is there any

indication of spatial or relationship between the registers, although sets of registers

were often given unity by setting a major figure, in this case Kagemni, at one end

overlooking what was happening in them. The lower border of each register acted as

the baseline for the figures within it. Part of the register was divided into subregisters

which then provided baselines for smaller figures within the original register. (Robins

1994 p. 6)

In Conclusion, Egyptian art represents not only figures but symbols, that is, images with

more concealed reference, whose depth of intuitive association cannot be explained

intellectually or exhausted verbally (Schäfer p. 159).

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Harpur Y. & Scremin P. (2006) The Chapel of Kagemni, Scene Details, Oxford

Expedition to Egypt, Oxford.

Pliny, The Natural History, Vol. VI, Book XXXV (trans. Bostock, J. & Riley, H.T.)

London (1857).

Robins, G. (1986) Egyptian Painting and Relief, Shire Publications LTD, Oxford.

Robins, G. (1994) Proportion and style in Ancient Egyptian Art, University of Texas Press

Robins, G. (2008) The Art of Ancient Egypt, Revised Edition, Harvard University Press,

Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Schäfer, H. (1919) Principles of Egyptian Art (trans. Baines, J.) The Alden Press,

Oxford 2002.

Sureda, J. (1993) Las Primeras Civilizaciones, Editorial Planeta, Barcelona.

Teeter, E. (1994) Egyptian Art, The Art Institute of Chicago (http://www.jstor.org/411249)

Tiradritti F. (2008) Egyptian Wall Painting (trans. Shore, M.) Abbeville Press, New

York, London

Web sites: www.osirisnet.net , April 2010.