The Influence Of Ancient Greek Painting And Sculpture On The Formation Of Its Imitation Theory

The term mimesis of Ancient Greece is comparable to fine art in its mordernoccidental sense. It covers various art forms, such as poetry, tragedy, comedy, painting,sculpture and music. Three philosophers-Socrates, Plato and Aristotle-have eachmade a distinguished contribution to this concept through discussions about variousaspects of mimesis: its subjects, methods, relations with reality, social functions, etc.The mimesis theory of Socrates was completely based on practices of paintingand sculpture. However, those of Plato and Aristotle, while acknowledging theinfluence of these practices, emphasize poetry, music and theatre. Aristotle’s mimesistheory particularly focused on poetry and tragedy. We could therefore affirm thatpainting and sculpture of Ancient Greece had exerced a considerable influence onmimesis theory; nevertheless, mimesis should not be considered, as Tatarkiewiczstated, to stand solely as a result of reflexions on painting and sculpture.