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The problem of the restitution of motion in the artistic images from classical antiquity is explored through the philosophical and anthropological conceptions of the movement in Greek thought. The concepts of σχῆμα and ῥυθμός are fundamental to clarify the dialectical relationship between movement and stasis in relation to μίμηεσις, both in dance, the “mimetic” art par excellence, and in the visual arts. A painted or sculpted figure is an ἠρεμία, an isolated punctum temporis, which nevertheless potentially contains the flow of movement, which the observer can mentally recreate by imagining what precedes and follows it. The views of the Ancients on this topic are compared with those of some modern thinkers (Lessing, Bergson, Deleuze) and the visual anthropology of Aby Warburg is reconsidered in the light of recent acquisitions of cognitive psychology and neuroesthetics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]