The "Greek Miracle"
...ent, they did not practice it in the same manner the Western World has embraced it. Of course, the United States (and most other countries) are not full democracies, but Republics which give suffrage to a far wider ranger of individuals than did the ancient Greeks. Also, the Greeks included legal slavery in their government. It is important to understand, however, that the Greeks were not people of the modern age, they were not influenced by such radical political uprisings as the French and American Revolutions. These, more than any understandings of old-style democracy, pushed the world into a state of modern political thought. Whicker 2 The connection between the visual arts and democracy is clearly demonstrated in our own world, as it was during the time of the Greeks, and much of our own imitation has been handed to us through the Neoclassicists -- Thomas Jefferson and his ilk. In our capitol, a tourist can view Greek-style memorials commemorating various high ranking and important US individuals. Just the same, in ancient Greece, massive structures were erected to the gods -- like the Parthenon -- to demote the political achievement of the Athenians, for which they thanked their virgin namesake goddess, Athena. This association between the visual arts and democracy give the viewer of such monuments a sense of the freedom of the builders, for they had the time, the security and the monetary resources to construct such astonishingly sophisticated monuments. However, it is important to note that, while the Greeks were revolutionary for their time, they were not the completely rational, utterly logical culture we seem to understand them as, today. This notion in fact is more of a Neoclassical notion -- their intellectual fire was fueled by the notion that everything in the universe could be explained with a rational mind. But the Greeks, with their wild adventure stories and deep-seated superstitions, were much more of a magical culture than we allow them to be, and their art reflected this. Often brightly colored, statues such as the Peplos Kore (Archaic Period) look remarkably unrecognizable, as compared to when we view them in their natural state -- white, clean, flat. The residual image most modern people carry is of a Greek culture that did not exist. The, however, does not mean the Greek culture which did exist is not just as important and valuable. The reality is that, whatever the culture existed as during antiquity, we have been indelibly marked by our own impressions of it, and these are what Western society was built upon. We may never imagine the Parthenon (High Classical Period) painted and decorated ...