The Second Style follows among other aspects the First Style and the illusionistic architectural wall painting already developed in the 3rd century B.C. (cf. Kallikles' and Lyson's graves in Levkadia, Macedonia):

In phase Ia of the Second Style, the wall painting is articulated by painted columns. This evokes an illusion of space; the viewer seems to be standing in a columnated hall, where columns seem to carry the ceiling.

Phase Ib shows a more complicated construction: the wall decoration contains more "depth" and is sometimes "opened" in the upper parts of the wall, by means of which a view on "open, blue air" is given, as if the wall would be an open structure. Often, a tholos (i.e. a round, little temple construction) is seem in the "open air" part. The rooms/ spaces behind the "opened" wall sometimes seem to be accessible through a painted door.

In phase Ic, the closing wall, suggesting a fence-like little wall, is left aside completely. Above the socle one can see a free view, mostly to a central columnade with a tholos in the center. The architecture is, like in phases Ia and Ib (but in a lesser way there), made more lively by numerous realistically painted still life-like motives of tapestry, like masks, metal vases, flora and fauna.

Phase IIa shows a return to closed-ness of the wall. The effect of so called Trompe l'Oeil from phase Ic makes way for a central aedicula (i.e. litt. "little building" a sort of frame construction), in which a figurative, non illusionistic painting has been made. Nouveautés are landscape- and mythological friezes to the upper rim of the wall (captured in an architectural frame).

In the last phase, IIb, a large figurative piece or scene is placed in the central part of a wall. The wall decorations are more and more closed. The relation between real and painted architecture is more and more lost. The columns become slim like delicate candelabres. The emphasis is on decoration, not on realism. The suggestion of space is totally lost: many motives are applicated "flattened". The color spectrum, having become more and more spectacular until phases Ic and IIa, gets more and more sober in phase IIb.

Problematic is the origin of the many constituing parts of the Second Style. A part of the material has been derived from the Hellenistic Orient, in particular Ptolemaic Alexandria (i.g. the Palace Architecture).

The problem with phase Ic is to which extent the schemes of the walls have been inspired on Hellenistic theater wing decorations, which have not been preserved (cf. Vitr. de Arch. VII.5.1-3) and which, in their turn, were a derivation of, among other aspects, eastern Hellenistic Palace architecture.

Other elements playing a role in phases Ib and Ic are:

a. Hellenistic (votive) paintings, depicted in the Second Style als "swinging door" paintings on the cornices (also in the Third and Fourth Styles).

b. So called megalographies: large panel-like paintings. This means: series of loose figures or groups are placed in front of an architectural background (cf. the triclinium scene at the Villa dei Misteri, Pompeii). The interpretation of these figures is very much disputed. Probably they are copies of paintings of Alexandrian groups of mythological statues, dressed in threatrical costumes.

Literature:

H.G. Beyen, Die Pompejanische Wanddekoration I/II, Den Haag 1938-1960

Ph.W.Lehmann, Roman Wall Paintings from Boscoreale in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Cambridge Mass., 1953

J. Engemann, Architekturdarstellungen des fruehen zweiten Stils, Heidelberg, Heidelberg, 1967

K. Fittschen, Zur Herkunft des 2. Stils in: Hellenismus in Mittelitalien, Göttingen, 1976, 539-563.

Tanaquil