Reign of The Pharaoh Akhenaten

"During the early part of Akhenaten's reign, the artistic style made a sudden transition from the traditional Egyptian style of portraying people with ideal, perfect physiques, to a new and rather jarring style, illustrated here in an extreme example in the image at right. It would seem that the artists were attempting to portray people (Akhenaten in particular) with brutal honesty, to the extent that the images became caricatures.The master sculptor, Bek, claimed to have been taught by Akhenaten himself. Whether this means that Akhenaten actually taught him his trade or merely told him what he wanted the art to look like Bek does not clarify, but the latter is probably more likely."

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Akh. would look over the process's of the creating of the statues and judged them harshly if the smallest detail was off. his physical appearance was just as important as his religion you could say. this is why he would judge them with strict harsh rules.He called himself Wa-en-Re which means unique on of Re. saying he was unique amongest all the other pharaohs, and placed this unique nature on his god Aten.

Akh. was son of Pharaoh Amenhotep lll and Queen Tiy. Akh. reigned from 1352 b.c. to 1336 b.c. art and religion changed drastically. during his fifth year he began the building process of the new capital Akhetaten which means "horizion of the sun"

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Akhenaten (often alt: Akhnaten, or rarely Ikhnaton)[1] meaning Effective spirit of Aten, first known as Amenhotep IV (sometimes read as Amenophis IV and meaning Amun is Satisfied) before his first year (died 1336 BC or 1334 BC), was a Pharaoh of the Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt. He is especially noted for attempting to compel the Egyptian population in the monotheistic worship of Aten, although there are doubts as to how successful he was at this. He was born to Amenhotep III and his Chief Queen Tiye and was their younger son. Akhenaten was not originally designated as the successor to the throne until the untimely death of his older brother, the Crown Prince Thutmose.

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Akh. had a feminine body with breasts and wide hips but none the less a man with a half a dozen children all females. He had an egg shaped head. He introduced a revolutionary form of monotheism to ancient Egypt during his reign. Donald B. Redford supposes that Akh. Had Marfan syndrome which causes genetic disorder marked by physical features like the face and fingers.

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This statue from Akhenaten's temple at Karnak is the three-dimensional equivalent of the relief above. This is the classic early period look of Akhenaten: feminine curves, heavy thighs and belly, half-closed eyes, full lips, and a long face and neck characterized representations of the king.(Picture from The Art of Ancient Egypt, by Gay Robins)

During the early years, there was a tendency for the artists to make Akhenaten's family members look like clones of him. Here, at right, is an early representation of either Nefertiti or Tiye, looking very much like images of Akhenaten from the early years. This cloning went out of fashion with the advent of the later style of Amarna art.

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Until the reign of Akhenaten, Egypt garnered strength from an adherence to age-old principles of religion and ruler ship. Considered by some a genius and others a heretic, Akhenaten brought radical change in religion and art. He did away with the polytheistic worship of multiple gods and introduced the worship of a single god, Aten, “the light of the sun,” which was represented as the sun’s disk. Abandoning Egypt’s traditional capitals of Memphis and Thebes, Akhenaten established the new city of Akhetaten (Horizon of Aten) known today as Amarna. This site had never been occupied before and belonged to no god, making it easier for the king to promote his new religion. Akhenaten opened the way for monotheism. He also did away with the idealized images that had characterized Egyptian art for the previous 1,500 years and replaced them with works that captured a more tender and less formalistic image of the human body.

The king and his family moved to Amarna around the sixth or seventh year of his rule (1347 - 46 B.C.). At this point, he underscored his break with the Amen priesthood by changing his name to Akhenaten, “one who is effective for Aten.” Later he even authorized the destruction of the name and all images of Amen, wherever and whenever they appeared. Akhenaten and his Queen Nefertiti were of course Amarna’s most important inhabitants. Sculpture and stela under Akhenaten provided many intimate glimpses of the royal family with their children—a type of representation unheard of under previous pharaohs. A pristine example of this type of family intimacy is depicted in Stela of the royal family, a delightful image of Akhenaten and Nefertiti playing with three of their daughters under the protective rays of Aten.

The city was a spectacularly colorful place, with walls, floors and ceilings painted or inlaid with colorful mosaic tiles. Portions of this brilliant array are seen in Bullock in a thicket, a fragment of a faience tile in greens and reds representing a calf among flora, as well as Floor painting with marsh plants. Several objects from everyday life are also represented, including an early toilet seat, musical instruments, jewelry, oil lamps, mirrors and a 3,500 year-old fragment of clothing. Because nothing existed in the area of Amarna before Akhenaten, temples, palaces, administrative buildings, barracks, granaries, food-preparation areas, roads, houses, estates, formal gardens and tombs were all constructed at an incredible pace. This remarkable city, whose population scholars estimate was between 20,000 and 50,000 people, is represented in the exhibition through a 20-foot, three-dimensional model, aerial photographs of the excavation site, and views of current excavations. Amarna remains a pristine example of a planned city from the middle of the second millennium B.C. Excavations began in the 19Th century, and continue today. All present understanding of this historically pivotal time period derives from excavations and from representations of the city’s institutions carved in relief on tomb or temple walls.

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This man viewed art and his artistic imagination highly. he would tell his professional artist what to paint and how. Also he viewed religion highly so highly in fact as you have read they should only worship one god, Aten. Aten was his god and he believed should also be the only god, therefore, making everyone only worship that god. this made this man's reign significantly important and new things evolved around this man's reign!