Hierarchical proportion

File:TombofNebamun-2.jpg

Nebamun hunting birds in the marshes using cats, fragment of a scene from the tomb-chapel of Nebamun, Thebes, Egypt Late 18th Dynasty, around 1350 BC.<ref name="British MuseumNebamun" />

Hierarchical proportion is a technique used in art, mostly in sculpture and painting, in which the artist uses unnatural proportion or scale to depict the relative importance of the figures in the artwork.

For example, in Egyptian times, people of higher status would sometimes be drawn or sculpted larger than those of lower status.

During the Dark Ages, people with more status had larger proportions than serfs. During the Renaissance images of the human body began to change, as proportion was used to depict the reality an artist interpreted.

Gallery

• Narmer-Tjet2.JPG

  The Narmer Palette - obverse side, Early Dynastic Period of Egypt, about the 31st century BC

• Victory stele of Naram Sin 9062.jpg

  Victory stele of Naram Sin, the Akkadian Empire in ancient Mesopotamia, 2350 - 2000 BC

• BD Weighing of the Heart.jpg

  The Weighing of the Heart from the Book of the Dead of Ani, 19th dynasty of the New Kingdom of ancient Egypt, c. 1250 B.C.

• Cancuenpanel3.jpg

  Panel 3 from Maya city Cancuén portraying the ruler Tajal Chan Ahk, 8th-century

• Clm 4453 fol 24r Detail Herrscherbild.jpg

  Otto III from the Gospels of Otto III, Reichenau Abbey in southern Germany, late 10th or early 11th century

• Autun St Lazare Tympanon.jpg

  Last Judgement by Gislebertus in the west tympanum of the Autun Cathedral in France, 1120 - 1146.

• Duccio maesta1021.jpg

  Maestà of Duccio, Siena, Italy, 1308 – 1311

• Hugo van der Goes 004.jpg

  Portinari Altarpiece, Flemish painter Hugo van der Goes for the church of the hospital of Santa Maria Nuova in Florence in Italy, c. 1475.

• Brooklyn Museum - Zumurrud Shah Takes Refuge in the Mountains - overall.jpg

  Zumurrud Shah takes refuge in the mountains (India, ca. 1570, illustration to Hamzanama<ref name="Hamzanama" />)

• Brooklyn Museum - Battle of Karbala - Abbas Al-Musavi - overall.jpg

  Battle of Karbala, Imam Husayn's half brother Abbas Al-Musavi in focus, Isfahan, Iran, late 19th - early 20th century <ref name="BrooklynMuseumKarbala" />

See also

• Art movement
• Creativity techniques
• List of art media
• List of artistic media
• List of art movements
• List of most expensive paintings
• List of most expensive sculptures
• List of art techniques
• List of sculptors

References

Bibliography

• Artforms by Preble, Preble, Frank; Prentice Hall 2004

External links

• 'Gifts for the Gods: Images from Egyptian Temples, a fully digitized exhibition catalog from The Metropolitan Museum of Art Libraries, which contains material on hierarchical proportion

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