Visual Analysis of Lamassu

Sihuang (Phoenix) Man

Anthony Viti

AHI-1010-B

Survey of World Art I

Visual Analysis

21st Oct. 2015

Visual Analysis of Lamassu

On week five, our whole class had a wonderful filed trip to the most famous museum, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, is one of the world's largest and finest art museum. Because of our studying topic, we went to Ancient Near Eastern Art exhibition area1.  The artworks that I analyzed were Lamassu and Seated Statue of Hatshepsut. And today, I am going to do visual analysis of Lamassu.

Lamassu, which is human-headed winged bull and winged lion1 (883-859 BCE), it was in Neo-Assyrian period, and during the Mesopotamia period, which in Ancient Near Eastern Art galleries. It is Stone mythological guardians. The reason I chosen this object, in that I am design person, I am so easy be attracted by different patterns and designing, also cares about details.

Junior year in my high school, I have learned the myth of Lamassu, there is no words can express my feelings. I was confused about several questions. Why ancient Neo-Assyrian people chosen human face, but lion body? But why lots of people define that is not lion body, it is cattle, and its wing is eagles ? Why they create this special fetish, what it is for？When I have questions, I feel like a boat looking for direction in the dark sea. After researching, I got all the answers that I need.

Firstly, when we want to know more about an artwork, analyzing the form of the work is need to be done. Line, color, shape, texture, and material. Lamassu’s lines are soft, fickle and smooth. the lines of Lamassu is continuous，like water flow, There are lots of curves and shapes. The curves appear repeatedly. The color is simple and unique, one single color, painted by white and grey. The reason that I said it is unique, because of its material--Gypsum alabaster1. Gypsum alabaster is a fine-grained, translucent form of gypsum, typically white, often carved into ornaments5. Human facial structure represents wisdom, human beings create our own civilization. The animal body structure, huge large monumental bulls, with hawk wings and always with human heads, were put as guards at the entrances of royal palaces like Khorsabad and Nineveh2.

The person who built it, was the Great Assyrian king Ashurnasirpal II (r. 883–859 BC)1 , wanted to have a vast building program at Nimrud, ancient Kalhu.1. The patterns on Lamassu, are total different but have little similar. They all have shapes, and are fluent. They all start at curves, and follow certain geometry logic and order. Geometry logic what I mean is made by lines and figures, and also can find the theory or law from the pattern, such as they all in the same direction or all have the same shapes. Authority, loyalism are two big topics of this piece2. We have to admit how skillful ancient Neo-Assyrian people were. Their works were very careful, finishing the whole piece without any crack.