ARTICLE
The aAspective as a way to display optics on realities.
Some aesthetic resources in Ancient Egypt's paintings and low-relieves help us to decode Egyptian's worldview, their representations of reality without the contamination coming from a linear perspective. The system that created the aesthetics in bidimensional arts in Ancient Egypt is known as aspective, a mix of projections in which what is represented partially appears from a frontal or lateral point of view, like elements seeming to crush or defy the laws of physics.
Six resources are mentioned here although they can be combined. They allow us to transcend the optical perception of the visual experience by clearying out what is real beyond the physical and sensorial, perceiving the most subtle sensations and the most invisible facets of acts. They show what certainly exists although beyond our physical perception, making the occult real and notorious, integrating what is believed to exist, and even including in the representation entities like ba or the intangible moment in which an illumination reactivates the existence. The resources defy appearances but not Ancient people's reality.
False transparencies or fake sections
They create the sensation that something is visible even behind another element, which in fact is not transparent.
A herd crossing a flooded area. The legs of the animals can be seen as well as those of the leading men. Saqqara. V Dynasty. Ancient Empire. Photo: Víctor Rivas.
With pleated clothes, different degrees of skin can be seen. New Empire. Photo: Susana Alegre García.
A priest wears a ritual animal mask indicating he's not a divinity (as they used to represent), so allows perceiving the authentic reality. Ptolemaic age.
Part of a funeral's procession: the widow crying, the ceremony Opening of the Mouth, the well taking to the mortician chamber with the mummy, its trousseau and the ba of the deceased, of human head and body of a bird, flying into the depth of the cavity. XVIII Dynasty.
The internal level of the construction is visible, with halls, passages, areas for food storage, furniture, containers and people walking through. Gizeh. VI Dynasty.
Bringing outside what's hidden, and putting it over
A narration of the expedition to the nation of Punt showing wealth as it was transferred to Egypt: a coffer remains closed but the representation allows us to know its contents in detail. Deir el-Bahari. XVIII Dynasty.
Showing in the front what could remain half-hidden if overlapped
Three prayers. In the linear perspective, it could seem they're strangely placed one over the other, as performing a kind of a circus' practice. In the adequate language of the height's perspective, the person below is the closest one and the one upon him is further away. The subtle overlapping suggests a very mild distance between them, what we can interpret tridimensionally as if men were placed one next to the other one and aligned in the floor, occupying different planes at distance. XVIII Dynasty.
Mourners. In the linear perspective, it could seem they're strangely floating, being upon a magical flying rug. In the height's perspective, it's understood they're further away, while the ones on the main registry, occupying the scene below, are the closest; the latter ones are in a theoretical first plane and the other three remain in an apparently second plane although, in fact, had been brought to the first one.
Representation of a donkey carrying saddlebags. Saqqara. V Dynasty.
Creating "globes" similar to those of comics
Although without words or any other kind of delimitation (there's no shape framing them), they indicate, extend and complement the narration, allowing a better understanding of what happens and alluding to what's not directly represented.
Carpenter is at work and, around him, there are objects related to his task, as floating. Saqqara. V Dynasty.
Vibration or stroboscopic effect
It suggests the sensation of being in motion or, at least, of an imminent move. It allows perceiving an alive, active and dynamic world, showing different processes or times into the same action, in the same image, as if instants or gestures of the event were fragmented, multiplied or decomposed in different phases and, at the same time, remaining on sight.
Tutankhamon on a chariot with horses and throwing arrows: as horses gallop and pull the chariot, the animal in the first plane practically hiddens many times the one in the second plane but, in the representation of the legs, is usually more visible the presence of the second animal. Kings' Valley. XVIII Dynasty.
Nebamon is on a hunt and balances over a boat while grabbing herons with his hand. Herons are flapping, shaking, trying to escape, agitated or "vibrating" in some despair. XVIII Dynasty.
Bullet point of the mortician ritual Opening of the Mouth, with a man holding a container for libations, with one side of his face repeated on several occasions, which remarks the detail that the container was being moved from up to down or down to up, as the arms made a balancing move. XIX Dynasty.
Three figures overlapped while whoreshipping: it's the same character repeated in three instants during the action of praying, elevating arms and kneeling, then mildly throwing the body ahead until resting the chin on the floor, or maybe in the reversed way. XVIII Dynasty.
Making times converge
Deciding what time to capture, whether by narrating a long process with different episodes of an activity, whether by capturing an instant or an anecdotic event. They could dissect time passing by or capture the past, present and future at the same time.
In some representations of the Supreme Judgement, the prosecuted is represented on two occasions. It was the Judgement people should submit to, for accesssing the other side, by weighing their hearts and a feather or Maat's figurine in a balance (psicostasia). It shows the deceased when accessing and greeting those who are going to judge him but, next to his own figure, his image is repeated although at another time, at the moment in which the balance had already shown a positive result. XXI Dynasty.
Representations of what could happen to people if they pay or not their taxes: if they pay, they could be entertained in front of the image of a high dignitary but, if they don't pay, they will be punished or hardly beaten. Thus they're represented in two chronological parallel lines depending on the action has been performed or not. XVIII Dynasty.
Source: Recursos para mostrar lo invisible. La realidad más allá de la óptica en la pintura y en el bajorrelieve del Antiguo Egipto, by Susana Alegre.
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