The Role of Landscape in Minoan Art

Abstract

It has been said that in Minoan art, we find "some of the world's first landscape paintings." However, Minoan landscape differs from more modern kinds of landscape in important respects, suggesting that the purpose of landscape in Minoan society may have differed from the purpose of landscape in modern society. In this paper I will consider the role of landscape painting in Minoan art and culture by a careful analysis of paintings from Crete and Thera. I will begin by providing a review of recent scholarship on the possible meanings and purposes of landscape art. Next, I will consider the role of landscape painting in Minoan art by a careful analysis of paintings from Crete and Thera and their formal similarities and differences from modern landscape art. I will continue by considering the suggestion, often made in the literature, that all Minoan landscape art is of a religious nature, and its counter-suggestion that the paintings were made for primarily aesthetic purposes. I will then consider a third possibility, that Minoan landscape painting was a form of ritual activity directed at maintaining a relationship between humans and their environment.