(235) One Hundred Years of Sather Classical Lectures 1914-2014:

Edition of 2039 of which 125 copies are signed 1-125, 27 copies are signed A-Zz as artist's proofs, 32 are signed as dedication copies. Three sets of progressives.

December 29, 2013

17-1/2" x 24"
7 Colors
Paper: Mohawk Superfine 100 lb. Cover

Influence: Chariot of Zeus portrayed by Klitias on an Attic volute krater, known as the François Vase, c. 575BC, Museo Archeologico, Florence

Client: University of California, Berkeley

1-125: Saint Hieronymus Press
A-Z: Artist's own use

Dedication copies: Maurizio Bettini; Frank Bezner; Anthony Bulloch; Tony Cascardi; Klaus Corcilius; Susanna Elm; G.R.F. Ferrari; Mark Griffith; Erich Gruen; Chris Hallett; Todd Hickey; Kate Murray Klingbiel; Robert Knapp; Leslie Kurke; François Lissarrague; Tony Long; Emily Mackil; Donald J. Mastronarde; Maria Mavroudi; Kathy McCarthy; Trevor Murphy; Richard T. Neer; Carlos Noreña; Nelly Oliensis; Nikolaos Papazarkadas; Ted Peña; Lisa Pieraccini; Dylan Sailor; Kim Shelton; Gary Spears; Andrew Stewart; Ron Stroud; Yasmin Syed; Carmi Jan Weininger.

Progressives: 2 sets to Saint Hieronymus Press, 1 set to Leslie V. Kurke

The François Vase, a black-figure volute krater, depicts 270 animals and mythological figures labeled with 121 inscriptions. It is signed "Klitias megraphsen, Ergotimos mepoiesen." (Klitias painted [me]; Ergotimos made [me]). The two Athenians flourished from 580 to 550 BC, and from what remains of their work, seem to have been a productive team.

Such a fragile, transient medium. So easily broken and then, irreparable, discarded on a trash heap or broken up still further for ostraka--pottery shards used to vote an Athenian citizen into exile. Twenty-five hundred years after the artist and potter labored together their reconstructed teamwork survives and is paid the highest praise--it is copied by another artist.

Copying is the way most literature is preserved. Few original autographic manuscripts have survived wars, fires and natural disasters. I have seen only a little of the world's art, architecture and sculpture; a fraction of the world's music has been performed live before me. Copies are not much like the original; to copy is to alter. But copies preserve things that might otherwise have been lost. What I know of these things is in reproduction, recordings, photographs. I have never seen the François Vase.

My copy of the horses drawing the chariot of Zeus changes and preserves, but it is also a new thing. I honor the shade of Klitias, and I can only hope that, twenty-five hundred years from now, someone will copy me.