This marble head was once attached to a body, probably a graceful nude in the tradition of the kouros in the gallery next door. This young man’s eyes look connected to the mind behind them; they sit in shallow but effectively carved eye sockets. Subtle cheekbones seem really to support the flesh of the face from inside. The lips are pressed together and turned up at the corners in the beginning of a smile.

Walk around the head to the left. Here you see a worn but well-formed ear set in the center of the head, where it really is on a human being. The sculptor has treated the hair as a caplike mass, but individual strands must have been added in paint. One lock of hair extends in front of the ear. If you go back to the front of the head, you see how nicely this curl and the one on the other side frame the face, intensifying the forward focus of the young man’s eyes.

In all likelihood, this is the head of an athlete. His perceptive looking face is the perfect complement to a well-trained physique. The athlete was an embodiment of the Greek concept of excellence, areteia, which embraced every sort of human greatness. The formal strength of the head matches the gravity of the concept it stands for; the athlete seems almost to understand his own meaning.