Ancient Greek sculpture, primitive bronze, made by Miron, marble, mid-5th century BC, Roman model,1.73m high, in Munich Museum of Ancient Sculpture.
The famous statue of the discus thrower is the masterpiece of the ancient Greek sculptor Miron, and is recognized as the masterpiece of the classical Greek period. This statue is often used as a symbol of sports and bodybuilding and is widely circulated.
Miron was a famous Greek sculptor in the middle of the 5th century BC. Miron and his works have been mentioned more than once in the literary works of ancient Greek and Roman writers. He is good at using bronze as a material, which can not only show the moving human body freely and accurately, but also show the famous animal hand. According to legend, the bronze bull statue he made for Mount Athens attracted greedy wolves. The horse he carved aroused the bray of a real horse. It can be seen that its carving skills are exquisite and its image is vivid. Unfortunately, none of Miron's original works have been preserved. Today, we are left with some marble sculptures by Roman craftsmen.
In ancient Greek society, martial arts became a norm, and urban citizens were proud of being able to recruit excellent fighters. They attach great importance to physical exercise, popular sports competitions, and advocate people to keep fit. In addition to holding competitive competitions in various cities at ordinary times, it is also stipulated that a large-scale competitive activity will be held all over Greece every four years in Arcturo Olympia, and the participants are all healthy naked men. Nowadays, the quadrennial World Olympic Games has inherited this tradition from Greece. In ancient Greece, the winner of the competition was regarded as the favor of God, which was extremely glorious and was warmly praised and admired by the whole people. The sculptor was asked to make a statue for him as a souvenir and worship the tree as an example to learn imitation.
The statue of the discus thrower is a memorial statue made for the winner of Olympia. In this statue, Miron depicts the instantaneous action of a competitor and vividly expresses the posture, muscle adaptability and strength of the discus thrower. The characters are intense and intense, and their facial expressions are calm and calm. In this seemingly contradictory treatment, they achieved ingenious unity and harmony, and expressed the discus thrower's highly calm will and confidence in victory. He bent down and swung his arms back and forth. This posture is the moment when the discus is about to be thrown, and it is the most tense and energetic moment in the action, as if an arrow is on the string, expressing the continuity of the action. Because this posture looks convincing, some modern athletes regard it as a model and try to learn and master this correct Greek throwing method. But in fact, it is not as easy as they think. They forget that the statue of Miron is not a "still shot" of a sports news film, but a Greek work of art, which has nothing to do with the best practical action of throwing discus.
According to the literature, Miron's other masterpiece "Bronze Statue of Dallas, the Long-distance Running Champion" also chose the instantaneous action in the movement, which made the long-distance runner show incisively and vividly, and he could almost hear his gasps. Unfortunately, the whereabouts of this work is unknown and has long been lost.