Page:Joseph Drew - Art Treasures and their Preservation scan.pdf/3

Rh finishing tool had just been given, and yet, notwithstanding their preservation and beauty, many of the works of our modern sculptors will bear a critical comparison with those of the same class, whilst like them they have become the imperishable records of our age, in which will be read the history of our art schools, and from which posterity will be enabled to judge of the elevation or decadence of our art productions. With what veneration and delight, however, do we examine even a fragment of a statue, if known to be by one of the ancient chiefs of the sculptor's art. For some time past the lovers of antiquities who frequent the British Museum have been waiting with anxiety for the removal of the screen behind which Mr. J. D. Crittenden, the well-known sculptor, has been engaged in the restoration of a fine marble statue of an athlete, the copy of a work by Polycletus, made by Stephanos, an artist who flourished at the time of Augustus Cæsar. The statue, admirably restored by Mr. Crittenden, has at length been unveiled, and now stands a valuable addition to the other works in the Museum. The statue is a free copy of the famous bronze figure of Diadumenos, by Polycletus, a celebrated sculptor of Sicyon, now Basilico, a town of Peloponnesus. Polycletus lived about 232 years B.C., and was universally reckoned the most skilful artist of his profession among the ancients. A companion statue, known as the Doryphorus, or spear bearer, by Polycletus, was regarded in antiquity as a figure in which the proportions of an athlete were presented in a form to serve as a canon for all succeeding sculptors. Stephanos lived about the time of Augustus, and appears to have been employed by that monarch in making copies of celebrated works of the great masters. The statue was found about ten years ago in the ruins of an ancient theatre at Vaison, in France—the ancient Vasio—and was purchased by the Museum in 1870. When found it was in several pieces, which were put together on the spot, and the lost portions restored, but in a manner so unsatisfactory that on its arrival at the Museum all the parts were separated and a new restoration was placed in the hands of Mr. Crittenden. The new portions are the left thigh, part of the left leg under the knee, left foot, right hand, and nose. Difficulties were felt in the execution of the new thigh, in making the outlines accurately continuous with the outlines of the original above and below the new portions, and in making the anatomical development to agree with the rest of the statue. The foot required three separate new pieces. The difficulty here was to express the exact degree of weight on the foot and pressure on the toes, the heel being raised from the ground. The thumb and all the fingers of the hand are new, with the exception of the tips of the two middle fingers, which