It wasn't always like that, though. Mycenaean artifacts, whether painted, sculpted or carved, are quite different. In some cases they're gorgeous, but their perspective is quite naive. Case in point:
What caused the change? Maybe it was a foreign influence. Maybe some people just had more leisure time. The only obvious conclusion is that things were in flux.
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I love looking at images of Mycenaean and Minoan artworks but I can't say I've thought much about how the styles developed over time. It's certain that the Golden Mean was a great discovery that would never have arrived without the appreciation of beauty and form in nature.
The Minoans preceeded the Mycenaean. When I indulged in a little Minoan art history, saddened as always that so little is left to us to study, I came across a quote from R. Higgins, an art historian:
Perhaps the greatest contribution of the Bronze Age to Classical Greece was something less tangible; but quite possibly inherited: an attitude of mind which could borrow the formal and hieratic arts of the East and transform them into something spontaneous and cheerful; a divine discontent which led the Greek ever to develop and improve his inheritance.
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