Painted statues look good and anyone who ignores that they were painted is a revisionist

Painted statues look good and anyone who ignores that they were painted is a revisionist.

They look garish and vulgar.
Absolutely no taste

I think it's an improvement honestly.

They feel more real and less ethereal or divine
Although how you take that is purely subjective

>armor with pink nipples
Who thought it's a good idea?

allright, I'm an artist so let me explain.
First of all, the way people try to "color" statues nowadays is completely retarded. They find traces of pigments on the surface of the stone, and then try to put it on the statue mechanically, like a 3 year old in his coloring book, becasue this is done by scientists wit habsollutely no knowledge on how shit usually gets painted properly.
I'm 100% sure that greeks, who were in no way retarded applied their paints in thin glazes, varying the tones and textures where it should vary. These things look like early 00's 3d models? or miniatures painted by a newfag who doen't know how to THIN THE PAINTS.
tldr: painted statues COULD look good and probably DID look good when the greeks painted them, but it's not a job any monkey could do

Have you got any pictures of archetypal examples?

>more real
Real Augustus was an ugly manlet.

bad or good examples

Good

It's actually pretty funny how Suetonius describes him as handsome and the shits on him.

>He was unusually handsome and exceedingly graceful at all periods of his life, though he cared nothing for personal adornment.
But then
>but in his old age he could not see very well with his left eye
>His teeth were wide apart, small, and ill-kept
>his hair was slightly curly and inclining to golden; his eyebrows met
>his nose projected a little at the top and then bent slightly inward
>His complexion was between dark and fair
>He was short of stature
How is this unusually handsome? Was Suetonius just fucking around?

I agree. Color transforms a statue from an inhuman block of stone or metal into a living, breathing person and allows the details to stand out as they were intended. There's nothing I hate more than generic metal statues that fail to give any humanity or individuality to the subject. People would feel a far greater connection to celebrated historical figures if they were presented as people rather than lifeless pieces of metal. Color also helps with providing historical context I think.

He was probably just fucking around.

Yea and my guess is they also mostly put on base colors.

That's the point. They were supposed to be ostentatious displays of wealth and power.

Also what's said here is correct. The only thing that can be detected are the base pigments that were applied directly to the stone. More paint applied on top of that and to varying degrees to create depth and texture that is completely lost on modern reproductions.

tfw no augustus bf and try to give him a son.

They've grown on me

Not to mention imagine being a trader from some other land coming to Rome for the first time. Sure you've probably seen some statues before, religious idols, or maybe even some older Greek or Eastern pieces.

You come to Rome and holy fuck they've replicated a human. This statue looks like he could reach out and grab you if you stared at him for too long. That's the fucking power of Rome. They can almost create life.

That shit would be mind blowing.

But the reconstruction in the op takes this into account, the reconstruction only going off of the base coats looks way different

Anyone suspect this is a shitty interpretation? Nigga looks like a cartoon character. Like the difference between giving a house painter and an actual artist the brushes.
>inb4 lack of dyes, there's fuckken red, blue, and yellow right there right now, he should have vascularity, redness, and stubble

the painting looks so fucking bad
they were probalby painted way better and more realistically

And it was done poorly

> Implying Augustus wasn't an anime protagonist IRL

Plus, it doesn't fit with the hyper-realistic tradition of Roman statuary.

how come you know?

That statue doesn't have the baby on it.

You're calling people revisionist while posting revisionist copies.

because it looks like shit to anyone with half a brain, if i were a patrician or an emperor i'd find artists who can paint as well as they make the shapes of the statues

>implying all Roman statues were veristic in style


You do know the Romans had a shifting culture, right? Verism is a Republican art form, an Augustus was going for something different.

wtf, I hate the greeks now

...

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the white man rises. Soon our marble brethern will free themselves of their pedsastellian chains and devour our enemies. Like titans from attack on titan.

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Oh no, the paint made him retarded

This is by far the worst.

literally drumpf

You will never know the existential agony of Augustus divorcing you the day after you gave birth for the most bullshit political reasons which have nothing to do with you and then takes your kid away from you to be raised by the original archetype of a wicked stepmother

...

Looks like a pajama Persian

>real-octavian
>black hair

Until scientists can get artists today to replicate what statues used to look like accurately then what we have currently (plain marble) is objectively the best looking.

Fuck I'd even wager they would still look better, love the look of statues without the fucking paint on them.

I think its another example of that cheeky Roman ironic wit