[John_KZ]

I remember looking into the mentioned paper last year. The only childish thing is the reconstruction methods they used.

Yes, they where painted in skin tones, but not like in #ff3399 or something. The reconstructions are unrealistic.

Of course it's still possible that the statues were tacky, but not _that_ tacky. They weren't painted with damn crayons.

[JoeAltmaier]

The original artists didn't have a whole palette of colors to choose from, just the paint colors that had been invented in their time. Lead white, cinnabar, Egyptian blue

[iguy]

This is true, but I'm sure the original painters were very skilled at working within these constraints. While quite a lot of reconstructions seem content to get the base colors only.

I also wonder how much of the time these statues spent freshly painted. It wasn't particularly durable & was often outdoors. So I presume that quite a lot of the time the paint was a bit patchy... and that this was part of why they bothered to use marble (or basalt) in the first place, not just whatever was convenient.

[JoeAltmaier]

Oh they got a lot of abuse. There's a Greek play where a lady asks "Have you got a statue penis in your pocket? Or are you just glad to see me" or something on those lines. Apparently they got vandalized often enough to make it a thing!