Vatican Museums

This kylix (goblet with handles on a stem used in drinking parties for sipping wine) is characterized by a black-figure decoration in the inner ring and red figures on the outside. Towards 530 B.C. Attic saw the fundamental revolution that led ceramicists to abandon the black-figure style and adopt that of red figures on a black painted background. This change permitted the ceramists to obtain a better definition of the details within the figures through painted rather than scratched lines, in accordance with the evolution of the art of painting. For a time the mixed application of the two techniques appeared on the same object, accompanying the transition towards the definitive adoption of the red figures. In this example, attributed to the Painter of Scheurleer, on the inside there is a man with a cudgel in black-figure style, while on the outside there is a javelin thrower among stone curlews in red-figure style.