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Doryphoros (Canon)
Artist / Origin: After Polykleitos of Argos (Greek, ca. 480/475–415 BCE)
Region: Europe
Date: 450–440 BCE
Period: 500 BCE – 1 CE
Material: Bronze
Medium: Sculpture
Dimensions: H: approx. 84 in. (213 cm.)
Location: Munich Museum, Munich, Germany
Credit: Courtesy of the Munich Museum
Vitruvian Man
Artist / Origin: Leonardo da Vinci (Italian, 1452–1519)
Region: Europe
Date: 1492
Period: 1400 CE – 1800 CE
Material: Pen and ink
Medium: Prints, Drawings, and Photography
Dimensions: H: 13 ½ in (34.3 cm.), W: 9 5/8 in. (24.5 cm.)
Location: Galleria dell’ Accademia, Venice, Italy
Credit: © The Gallery Collection/CORBIS
Conceptions of bodily beauty and perfection are not universal. Rather, they are constructs of particular people at particular moments in history. Since ancient times, art has been a means of refining, codifying, and representing these ideals. Both Polykleitos’s Doryphoros and Leonardo’s Vitruvian Man offered other artists standards after which to model their own works. These works, in turn, offered audiences images by which to measure themselves.