Young Athlete in Repose

As Greek sculptors sought to perfect the youthful male body, they explored systems of proportion and balanced composition. In the mid-fifth century BCE, the sculptor Polykleitos addressed these subjects in a treatise entitled Canon. His statue of a spear carrier in the contrapposto stance of opposing balances apparently exemplified the Canon’s principles. The statue of a boy here stands in the Polykleitan tradition but combines the contrapposto with a leaning pose. The boy’s weight is on his proper right leg; his raised right hip and lowered right shoulder give the body a curve. The weight-bearing leg was counterbalanced by a relaxed arm, while the arm above the relaxed leg was propped on a pillar, bearing weight. Numerous bronze images of victorious athletes once stood at Olympia and in other Greek sanctuaries; this statue may replicate one by a successor of Polykleitos, or it may represent a classicizing Roman statue type, perhaps depicting a beautiful mythological youth, such as Adonis, Hyacinth, or Narcissus.