View source for Echion (painter)

'''Echion''' ({{langx|grc|Έχίων}}), also known as '''Aetion''' (Ἀετίων), was a celebrated [[Ancient Greece|Greek]] painter  in the latter half of the fourth century B.C.<ref>[https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.04.0062%3Aalphabetic+letter%3DA%3Aentry+group%3D8%3Aentry%3Daetion-harpers Harry Thurston Peck, Harpers Dictionary of Classical Antiquities (1898), Aëtion]</ref> spoken of by [[Lucian]],<ref>[[Lucian]], ''De Merced. Cond.'' 42, ''Herod'', or ''Aëtion'', 4, &c., ''Imag.'' 7.</ref> who gives a description of one of his pictures, representing the marriage of [[Alexander the Great]] and [[Roxana]].<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal |last=Förster |first=Richard |date=1894 |title=Die Hochzeit des Alexander und der Roxane in der Renaissance |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/25167339 |journal=Jahrbuch der Königlich Preussischen Kunstsammlungen |volume=15 |issue=3 |pages=182–207 |jstor=25167339 |issn=1431-5955}}</ref> This painting excited such admiration when exhibited at the [[ancient Olympic Games]], that Proxenidas, one of the judges, gave the artist his daughter in marriage.<ref name=":0" /> 

Echion seems to have excelled particularly in the art of mixing and laying on his colors. It has commonly been supposed that he lived in the time of Alexander the Great; but the words of Lucian show clearly that he must have lived about the time of [[Hadrian]] and the [[Antonines]]. [[File:Venus and Mars National Gallery.jpg|thumb|left|350px|''[[Mars and Venus (Botticelli)|Mars and Venus]]'' by [[Sandro Botticelli]], c 1485. Tempera and oil on [[Populus|poplar]] panel, 69 cm x 173 cm.<ref>{{cite web| url = https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/sandro-botticelli-venus-and-mars| title = NG page}}</ref>]] [[Aloys Hirt]] supposes that the name of the painter of Alexander's marriage, whom Lucian praises so highly, as Aetion, is a corruption of Echion.<ref>Gesch. d. Bild. Kunste, w.265—268.</ref><ref>{{Citation
  | last = Mason
  | first = Charles Peter
  | author-link = 
  | contribution = Aetion (2)
  | editor-last = Smith
  | editor-first = William
  | title = [[Dictionary of Greek and Roman Biography and Mythology]]
  | volume = 1
  | pages = 51
  | publisher = 
  | place = Boston, MA
  | year = 1870
  | contribution-url = http://www.ancientlibrary.com/smith-bio/0060.html
  | access-date = 2007-11-04
  | archive-date = 2010-06-08
  | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20100608005629/http://www.ancientlibrary.com/smith-bio/0060.html
  | url-status = dead
  }}</ref>

[[Sandro Botticelli]] drew on Lucian's [[ekphrasis]] in his ''[[Mars and Venus (Botticelli)|Mars and Venus]]'' ({{Circa|1485}}, now [[National Gallery]]), borrowing the amoretti playing with Alexander's armour during the ceremony, two carrying his lance and one who has crawled inside his breastplate. 
{{clear}}

==See also==
*[[List of ancient Greeks]]
*[[List of painters]]

==References==
{{reflist}}

==Sources==
* {{SmithDGRBM|title=Aetion. 2 |url=https://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/moa/ACL3129.0001.001/66?rgn=full+text;view=image}}

{{Ancient Greek painters}}

{{Authority control}}
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[[Category:Ancient Greek painters]]
[[Category:Painters of Alexander the Great]]
[[Category:Year of birth unknown]]
[[Category:Year of death unknown]]

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