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Detective Scientists Discover Ancient Clues in Mummy Portraits
Northwestern University ^ | February 15, 2016 | unattributed

Posted on 02/16/2016 8:57:29 PM PST by SunkenCiv

A Northwestern University research team has taken CSI to a whole new level: employing sophisticated scientific tools to investigate details of the materials and methods used by Roman-Egyptian artists to paint lifelike mummy portraits more than 2,000 years ago. These visages of the dead are considered to be antecedents of Western portraiture.

Marc Walton and his interdisciplinary team have uncovered telling clues about the paintings' underlying surface shapes and colors. The new details, when coupled together, provide the researchers with very strong evidence as to how many of the 15 mummy portraits and panel paintings were made.

Walton, a senior scientist at the Northwestern University-Art Institute of Chicago Center for Scientific Studies in the Arts (NU-ACCESS), shared details of the nearly two-year investigation yesterday (Feb. 14) at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) annual meeting in Washington, D.C., in both a presentation and press briefing.

The researchers identified the pigments used by the artists and the order the paints were applied and to which regions, as well as sources of materials and the style of brushstrokes used. Details of the pigments and their distribution led the researchers to conclude that three of the paintings likely came from the same workshop and may have been painted by the same hand.

This knowledge will help scientists, art conservators and art historians better understand how painting techniques evolved in the Byzantine Empire and beyond.

(Excerpt) Read more at northwestern.edu ...


TOPICS: History; Science; Travel
KEYWORDS: egypt; godsgravesglyphs; marcwalton; mummies; northwesternu; nuaccess; romanempire
Credit: Marc Walton, Northwestern University

Credit: Marc Walton, Northwestern University

1 posted on 02/16/2016 8:57:29 PM PST by SunkenCiv
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To: StayAt HomeMother; Ernest_at_the_Beach; decimon; 1010RD; 21twelve; 24Karet; 2ndDivisionVet; ...

2 posted on 02/17/2016 4:00:08 AM PST by SunkenCiv (Here's to the day the forensics people scrape what's left of Putin off the ceiling of his limo.)
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To: SunkenCiv

Bump


3 posted on 10/17/2018 10:14:44 PM PDT by BenLurkin (The above is not a statement of fact. It is either satire or opinion. Or both.)
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To: BenLurkin
Thanks, this topic didn't exactly set the internetz on fire.

4 posted on 10/17/2018 10:35:42 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (and btw -- https://www.gofundme.com/for-rotator-cuff-repair-surgery)
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