In Pliny the Elder鈥檚 encyclopedic Natural History, written in the first century AD, he recounts the story of a painter, Protogenes. Attempting to capture the foam around a dog鈥檚 mouth, Protogenes became so frustrated that he threw a sponge at the canvas.
鈥淔or Pliny,鈥 says , associate professor of classics, 鈥渋t becomes this wonderful archetype of how nature is herself an artist. The human artist is the unwitting agent of nature, grappling with raw materials, and also shaped by their properties and affordances. Pliny uses this to convey the material nature of painting and the complex relationship between nature and culture.鈥
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