Ancient Near Eastern art, architecture, and archaeology in contemporary debate: the problem of artistic production in the Southern Levant – Part 1
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.54260/eb.v39i147.984Keywords:
art, architecture, archeology, Ancient Near East, Southern LevantAbstract
The contemporary debate on the recognition that sophisticated art and architecture was produced in the Ancient Near East has reached a level of investigative maturity, using the tools of archaeology, but also of aesthetics, semiotics, history, and others. Thus, scholars have concluded that Mesopotamian art possesses the same grandeur as Egyptian and Greek art. Despite this, part of the region that makes up the Ancient Near East was considered peripheral in comparison to the Mesopotamian world. The Southern Levant, the place where most of the biblical narrative took place is in this situation and is considered peripheral, not only in art, but also in architecture. To adhere to this thesis without questioning it is to disregard that the same tools used to classify Mesopotamian art can be instruments for a critical reading of Levantine art, considering its peculiar characteristics, even if in a smaller numerical and qualitative proportion. One cannot relegate any artistic production to a peripheral minority. The first part of this article deals with the use of conceptual and critical tools in the classification of Ancient Near Eastern artistic production.
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