LOT 0086

Greek Red-Figure Bell Krater with Warrior Funerary Offering Scene, Attributed to CA Painter

CAMPANIAN, 350-300 B.C.

11 5/8 in. (2.38 kg, 29.5 cm high).

Comprising a bell-shaped body with narrow stem and stepped pedestal foot, broad rim with square loop handles and palmettes beneath, frieze to sidewall: Side A: Oscan warrior with cuirass, helmet, shield and spear standing beside an altar with a female holding a patera in her extended hand, diadem in the other at her side; Side B: seated female with a patera and wreath facing a standing cloaked figure with thyrsus.

Private collection, Geneva, acquired in the late 1960s.
Private collection, acquired in Geneva in 2000.

Accompanied by collector's notes and old images.
Accompanied by an original copy thermoluminescence analysis report no.QED1412/.SG-0602 from QED Laboratoire.
Accompanied by an academic report by Dr Raffaele D'Amato.
This lot has been checked against the Interpol Database of stolen works of art and is accompanied by search certificate number no.13219-249314.

Cf. similar style in Paul Getty Museum, inv. no.71.AE.301 in Jentoft-Nilsen, M.R., Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum, The J. Paul Getty Museum-Malibu, South Italian Vases, Apulian Red-Figure, Malibu, 1990, p.16 pl.151; see an identical warrior represented on a red figure lekythos at the Capua museum (fig.1) and another amphora in the same museum, coming from the Necropolis of Caivano (Napoli) (Fig.2); for other similar works see a terracotta skyphos in the MET, accession no. 91.1.444.

The krater offers an interesting glimpse into the local life of Campania in the 4th century B.C. Particularly noteworthy is the depiction of the Oscan Samnite warrior, fully armed in the style of Campanian, Samnite, or Lucanian mercenaries, performing a funerary sacrifice. The depiction of the Chalcidian helmet, with its central crest and twin lateral plumes (geminae pinnae), dedicated to Mars, is extremely detailed.

The style and the way in which the figures are realised, the conformation of the women, the details of the warrior, seem to point to the workshop of the CA Painter, a Campanian red-figure vase-painter whose name is unknown. Nevertheless, consistent individual characteristics of style suggest the existence of a unique artistic personality. Trendall called him the CA Painter because he was the chief painter in the first stage of Cumaean red-figure vase-painting, the initials standing for Cumaean (C), first stage (A).