Gardner's Art Through the Ages: Egypt Old Kingdom

Old Middle and New
Kingdom is when Upper and Lower kingdom are united
When at war is a unified period

A rule or especially body of rules or principles generally established as valid and fundamental in a field or art or philosophy; "the neoclassical canon"; "canons of polite society"

Ka - lifeforce; lives on after the death of the body or can reside in a statue.

Maat
- the idea of order in a world of chaos -- maintaining balance over good and evil (if you have evil you have to have the balance of good) maintaining harmony

Personified as a Goddess or sometimes an ostrich feather

Shape of the pyramid is a masaba and when you lay masaba after masaba that become smaller and smaller you build a stepped pyramid

Pallete of Narmer, from Hierakonpolis Dynasty 1, c. 3150-­‐3125 BCE. Slate, height 25” Egyptian Museum, CairoPalette of King Narmer, Predynastic, ca. 3000 BCE - Ka statue - stone slab in low relief. Found in Northern Upper Egypt. 2' high. Because of the largeness thought it was ceremonial. Usually Pallatte stones are used to grind eye makeup. Front and back of palatte divided into registers.

Stepped Pyramid and mortuary precinct of Djoser (first king of Old Kingdom), Old Kingdom -- designed Imhotep (court architect, artist, legislative system, everything which indicates that he was high up in the court and probably signing off and not really designing. His name was inscribed so he must have been really important)
Made of limestone

Great Pyramids of Giza: Khufu, Khafre, Menkaure Dynasty 4, Gizeh, Old Kingdom
square base and sloping triagular faces. Angled sides represented the rays of the sun. The slopes that the kings could climb up the "sun rays" to reach Raa. The pyramid is where the kings are reborn into the afternlife. Faced with limestone.
1st (and largest) built by Khufu and is a solid mass of limestone except for the burial chambers and galleries. Horizen of Khufu. Base is 13 acres and about 45 stories tall
2nd (smallest) was built by Khafre - Great is Khafre
3rd (medium) built by Menkaure - Divine is Menkaure

Great Sphinx, Gizeh, 4th Dynasty, 2570-2544 BCE, Old Kingdom, sandstone

Ka Statue of King Khafre
Dynasty 4, ca 2420 - 2494 BCE
Diorite
Horus
Archaic smile - sort of smirk

Menkaure and a wife, Gizeh
4th Dynasty, Old Kingdom
graywacke
tied to the stone, very stiff posture, not a lot of negative space but seeing an attempt to depict what's under the clothes- an attempt at naturalism. Ka statue but accompanied by one of his wives. The fact that she has her arm around him shows that they are united. One foot stepped forward - thrust forward into the afterlife

Seated Scribe. Dynasty 5, c. 2510-2460 BCE. Painted Limestone, height 21”. Musee du Louvre, Paris.

Ti hunting for Hippos in the marshes, Mastaba of Ti at Saqqara, 5th Dynasty, 2510-2460 BCE Old Kingdom

Private funerary sculpture
Man and Wife
Memi and Sabu
made of a softer stone than Menkaure