Analysis of Statue of Ramesses II

The piece of artwork that I am going to be doing my visual analysis essay on is the Colossal Statue of Ramesses II. This statue shows a king sitting on his throne with many inscriptions carved into the statue. The Colossal statue of Ramesses II is from the New Kingdom 19th dynasty from the years 1279-1213 B.C. This statue is in the round, intaglio engraving, and made of diorite. The museum collection that this statue is from is the Egyptian Antiques collection.

The Colossal Statue of Ramesses II shows Ramesses in the customary pharaonic pose. He is sitting on a cubic throne with his hands on his thighs, wearing the nemes headdress, and he has a fake beard. Ramesses II is totally nude except for a skirt-like piece of clothing. Ramesses II looks very masculine and he has a very muscular body. There are many different inscriptions carved all over the Colossal Statue of Ramesses II. The different names and titles of Ramesses II are carved on the his belt buckle and on the back and side of the throne. Each side of the throne also has images that represent "the union of the two lands".

There are many different stylistic features of the Colossal Statue of Ramesses II. This figure is bilaterally symmetrical which means the left side is a mirror image of the right side. The statue of Ramesses is facing forward which is called frontalism. The false beard that Ramesses has is stylized with a zigzag pattern. The sharply carved lines on the statue indicate bulging muscles on his body. This statue was probably made using the canon of proportions which is a standard formula used for representing the human form. A mathematical formula is used to plot the figure on a grid which made all of the statues from this time period look the same.

The Egyptian pharaoh was the living embodiment of the god Horus, who is represented by a falcon/hawk. When the pharaoh dies, he becomes Osiris (the mummy god) who is the ruler of the dead. It was also believed that when the pharaoh dies, he will live forever in the afterlife. The pharaoh's would spend their lives making tombs so that their soul, or ka, had a place to live for eternity. This Colossal statue of Ramesses II is very similar to a lot of the works of art that we studied from the New Kingdom period of Egyptian Art. This is because during that time period something called the canon of proportions was used to made statues. This is a standard