Red-Figure Bail Amphora (Storage Vessel): Draped Women

A CLOSER LOOK

The museum identifies this ceramic as ceramic and credits CA Painter, Walters Sub-group (South Italian, Campanian, active at Cumae, c. 350–320 BCE).

The museum's collection notes: The bail amphora, named for the tall handle arching over the mouth, is a shape made primarily in Campania, where red-figure vases were produced at both Capua and Cumae in the 4th century BC. The anonymous painter of this vase is known as the CA Painter, for Cumae A, the first significant artist in this area. The seated and standing women on both sides of the vase, some only partially draped (and their white skin now largely lost), recall those on many of the painter’s other vases, as do the elaborate palmette patterns on either side.