Detail of a South Italian Volute Krater with a Deceased Youth in the Getty Villa, July 2008

Mixing Vessel with a Deceased Youth
Attributed to the Underworld Painter
Greek, Apulia, South Italy, 330 - 320 B.C.
Terracotta
25 in.
96.AE.117

Funerary scenes decorate both sides of this Apulian red-figure volute-krater. On the front, a youth and a woman bring offerings to a naiskos, a small funerary shrine. A young man seated in the naiskos holds a theatrical comic mask. Both the naiskos and the seated youth are painted white in order to simulate marble or stone, an indication that the seated figure is actually a statue of the deceased. The mask and the scroll lying on the ground at his feet suggest that he was an actor who chose to have his career commemorated on his funerary monument. The back of the vase depicts a funerary stele with another pair of offering bearers.

The combination of two funerary scenes, one with a naiskos and one with a stele, was a popular motif on large Apulian funerary vessels of the later 300s B.C. Aside from the main scenes, most of the surface of this vase is covered with elaborate decoration. The intricate design on the neck with a satyr's head sprouting from tendrils, the florals under the handles, and the female heads in the handle volutes are all typical of the relentless ornament favored in the Apulian "Ornate Style."

Text from: www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=35474