because the ancient statues, altough realistic, weren't depicting the truth, because everyone wants to look better than they actally look
I'm not so sure. Roman and Estruscan statuary in particular had a tendency to be brutally realistic. Like there's a statue of an etruscan landwhale where they carved the cellulite into her batwings.
Later in the empire statuary and painting became much more abstract, but not necessarily more flattering. They just returned to an earlier style where they used generic symbols instead of drawing what they actually saw.
But think about it. You're an emperror or some other high ranking official and you hire a sculptorbor a painter. Would you have him depict you as you are or would you have him sculpt an idealized version. Remember that until only recently people would know how their leader actually looks. There was no tv or photos, so the only way people could know how you looked was through paintings and sculpture. So even if not for an inflated ego you would depict yourself better than you are so that ordinary people would respect your power, as they would see you as better and greater then themselves.
Presidential portraits seem fairly true-to-life. Idk, if you're that much of a narcissist don't you already love yourself? So much so that you'd want the artist to display you - not some artist's depiction of you?
yea maybe with height or weight but identity?
That was a common practice in other dynasties, but in roman culture it certainly appears that they placed a high value on accuracy and despised vanity. By the time they began dropping those values later in the empire, art was more symbolic anyhow so it didn't really matter how people were depicted.
If your ego was so great, such as that of an emperor, you may be completely unashamed and actually think your body was peak humanity.
i would ask for him to make me look as mean as possible. "more forehead veins please mario"
what baffles me is the range of facial features. nose shape. ear location. skin tone and eye color. maybe its more of a ruling class thing but many look very generalized and homogenized European
The emperors didn't come from a single lineage. Initially they were Caesarean Julii, but as time went on it was more of a case that the army would just pick someone and make them the emperor. Many of them weren't even Roman.
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