Czére Andrea szerk.: A Szépművészeti Múzeum közleményei 105. (Budapest, 2006)

ANNUAL REPORT - A 2006. ÉV - JUDIT LEBEGYEV: Highlighted Works of Art: Chamber Exhibitions Organized by the Collection of Classical Antiquities

the collection of the Museum of Ethnography, which was made in a Hungarian workshop in Transylvania, was used to prepare meals that take a long time to cook. The small jug from Korond was intended for use in traditional Jewish purification rituals that are still observed today. The unusual arrangement of the handles also serves a special purpose in this case: holding one handle of the jug with the hand that needs to be washed, one can sprinkle water on the other, which, thus washed, can take the other handle which is still untouched by the unwashed hand. In the autumn (5 September - 26 November) terracotta figurines made in the workshops of South Italian Tarentum (present day Taranto) were exhibited. The two reliefs and the four heads belong to a group of terracottas representing symposium scenes. At the core of the composition is a male figure reclining on a kline and resting on one elbow, who holds one of the accessories of the symposium: a kantharos, or lyre, sometimes but more rarely depicted as an egg. The location and context in which these terracottas were found, mostly in the sacred area and necropolis of Fondo Giovinazzi near the bay of Taranto, suggests that they were offered as votive gifts, and associated with the afterlife as well as the transition from life to death. It remains a matter of debate, however, whether the banqueting male figure wearing festive headgear should be identified with a hero venerated by the local community, i.e. with a mortal man elevated to the status of a hero by his transition to the afterlife, or with the Lord of the Underworld, Dionysos associated with Hades. This class of terracottas were produced for more than two centuries from the second half of the sixth century to the end of the fourth century BC, without substantial changes in their composition. At the same time, subsequent generations continuously renewed the style of the figurines following the contemporary innovations of mainland Greek artistic centres. Several stylistic variations were present at the same time, reflecting the work of artisans whose skills were derived from various traditions or influenced by differing personal taste. The centrepiece of the winter exhibition (5 December, 2006 - 25 February, 2007) was a vase from Southern Italy decorated with the representation of a comedy mask, which was recently