Apelles (lived 4th century BC)

Greek painter, one of the most celebrated of antiquity. No trace of his work, which was praised for its startling realism, now remains. He was court artist to Philip II of Macedon and then to Alexander the Great, whose portrait Apelles alone was allowed to paint.

Apelles studied in the studio of the Greek painter Pamphilos (fl. c. 390–350 BC) at Sicyon, near Corinth, one of the centres of Greek painting. Realism and an ability to convey three-dimensional effect are suggested by anecdote; thus in his Alexander Wielding a Thunderbolt the hand, according to the Roman writer Pliny, seemed to come out of the picture. His Aphrodite Anadyomene, showing Venus rising from the sea and wringing her wet hair, was painted for the sanctuary of Aesculapius on the island of Cos. The Roman emperor Augustus later bought it from the island and took it to Rome. Apelles wrote a treatise on painting, which has also disappeared, and was noted for his skill in using only four pigments – white, yellow, red, and black.