Smith, W. Stevenson. The Art and Architecture of Ancient Egypt. London: Penguin Group, 1988.
This book gives a highly detailed survey of Egyptian art and architecture and begins with an introduction that gives a brief history of Egypt from the Predynastic period through until Ptolemaic period. This includes a history of Egyptian religion with brief descriptions of various deities. There is also a description of how the artists worked and why they worked. This was very helpful to my study.
Smith compares the Egyptian artist's perception with the contemporary artists of Mesopotamia and how they differed. He says that an abundant supply of materials was a large influence on the large, block-like designs in Egyptian sculpture. This was opposed to the Mesopotamian artist who had to import their stones, which led to smaller, more rounded forms. Smith also says that the Egyptian artists' surroundings led to a rationalized approach in their style of art as opposed to the more imaginative art of the Cretans. Smith writes,
Thus, within certain limits of his conventions, the Egyptian approaches his subject with careful, painstaking attention to detail. He has a matter-of-fact rather than an imaginative attitude to the world about him, and when he deals with supernatural things manages with a cheerful kind of assurance to give them a familiar, everyday look.
Even the most remarkable monsters are rather dryly concieved, and one of his most surprising acheivements was the convincing naturalness with which were combined human and animal parts in composite form for the representation of his gods. The Egyptian mind did not run riot in imagining such strange and frightening spirits as appear on the seal designs of Mesopotamia and Crete. Instead there is an almost complacent acceptance of the orderliness and continuity of existance in a mild climate which was spared a good many of the more frightening caprices of nature. There is no expression of that anxiety with which the Mesopotamian regarded harshness of nature, nor did the Egyptian's surroundings provide him with the broken mountain crags and seascapes that stirred the imagination of the inhabitants of the Aegean.
The remainder of the book is divided into chapters, by dynasty, which describe art and architecture from predynastic to the end of dynastic Egypt. Smith's descriptions are very detailed and informative. He relates the artwork to the social and religious attitudes of Egypt when the artwork was produced. An excellent example of this is the description of a colossal sculpture of Ankhenaten produced during his reign in the Armana period. Smith writes,
There is an attempt to express a view of humanity and its frailties which man had been groping to realize since the more austere thought of the Middle Kingdom. Now, as in Hymm to the Aten, we find a heightened awareness of mankind in general as well as a new sense of life, movement, and that seldom-to-be-expected element, timelessness.
Another example of Smith describing the attitudes of Egyptian society is his description of the temple of Ramesses II at Abu Simbel. He writes,
The larger of the two temples cut out by Ramesses II at Abu Simbel, on the east bank of the Nile some forty miles north of the Second Cataract, is celebrated for the four seated figures of the king on it's facade. They are over 65 feet high, that is larger than the Colossi of Memnon. In spite of the tremendous impression produced, a certain emptiness of conception is evident here which pervades the work of Ramesses II. Too much reliance is placed on mere size and there is a decided coarsening in workmanship.... The traditions of the Egyptian craftsmen were to prove so deeply rooted that in the future they would be susceptable to new stimulus and impressive revival, while capable of the ordinary maintenance of extrodinarily high quality. Nevertheless, the vast schemes of Ramasses II overtaxed the means at hand and contributed to the further impoverishment of the Egyptian spirit. This is evident in the re-use of earlier materials.
Descriptions like this were very important and informative to my study. The chapters also talked about architecture that was equally interesting, but not valuable to my study. This is a book I would recommend to anyone who wants a complete, informative resource on art and architecture throughout all periods of Egyptian history. It is well illustrated and precise in its descriptions of artworks.
W. Stevenson Smith studied at the University of Chicago and received a Ph.D. from Harvard in 1940. He joined the staff of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston in 1928 where he later became a member of the Joint Egyptian Expedition of the Museum of Fine Arts and Harvard University. He traveled to Egypt, Europe, and the Near East from 1930 to 1939. He later returned to Egypt in 1946 and 47 again as part of the Harvard/Boston Expedition and was appointed Lecturer in the Egyptian Art at Harvard. He returned to Egypt in 1951 as Director of the American Research Center, and in 1956 was appointed Curator of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. He died in 1969.