Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 17.djvu/794

SCULPTURE. for the great tenacity of copper and the suiiie- wliat loss but still available Uiiigliness ami ex- pan^ibility of bronze, together with llie perfeet ease uitli wliieli tlic precious metals can be manipulated in this way, have always induced the artist to work in thin plates, embossiiif,' them bv banunerint! from the 'wrong' side and then chasing and perhaps engraving the face so as to modify the original embossing. (See Re- POlssfiE.) This is done (m a very large scale in the case of colossal bronze statues, wliieli are commonly made of plates of bronze hammered into reliefs and depressions and afterwards bolted together, and also in producing small decorative vessels. Forms of Sculptube. As to its form and character sculpture is divisible into that which is in relief (see KelieI'' Sculpture), in wliieli the masses project slit;litly from a solid surface, and that 'in the round." to use a phrase common aMU)iig artists and which denotes statues, busts, free groups, and the like. It is, of course, difficult to draw this line of demarcation very sharply ; tluis there are terra-cotta statuettes of the Asiatic ta-eek epoch and modern carvings, both tiriental and Western, in which a flat plate of material is cut throvigb (pierced, or a jour) and is carved or moUled on one side only into its characteristic and expressive forms. This is in fact a relief without a background. A similar doubt arises in the case of figures in very high relief. In composi- tions of this character it often happens that a head, a limb, or even a whole figure, except for a small point of attachment, is free from the l)ackground, as in the statues filling the pedi- ments of Greek temples, and the carving of the Gothic churches of the fourteenth century in France and elsewhere. There is one form of sculpture in which the background has not been smoothed off by the removal of the solid material down to the level of the ground of the relief. This is seen on a large scale in the wall-sculptures of Egyptian pylons and propylons, and in the eighteenth-cen- tury ivory work of the Japanese, and is what is known as coelanaglyphie sculpture, or, more simply, concavo-convex sculpture. It is really a process of detaching a certain part of a larger surface by means of an outline formed by an in- cision, and the further process of manipulating everything within that incision until the head so bounded becomes much more than a mere delineation and is wrought into modulations of surface until a semblance of solid form is se- cured. The Sculptor at Work. A model of clay is commonly used in all works of sculpture. In works of cast metal (see Foitstding) the sculptor's activity, except the final chiseling of the metal, ends with the model from which the statue is made. In marbles the Greeks, indeed, are reputed to have worked some^iines without one, and Michelangelo seems to have used only a small wax model or a sketch. The usual modern process is to make a preliminary sketch of wax or clay on a small scale. An iron skeleton of about the proportions of the intended statue is then set upon a stand with a movable top. en- abling the sculptor to work conveniently on all sides. Upon this skeleton modeling clay, moist- ened by water or stearin and glycerin, is laid, and the sculptor models the figure with bone and ■wooden tools. When the model is finished piece- molds of plaster are applied from which the statue is cast in plaster. The conversion of this model into stone is a more complicated process. The model and the block to be carved are placed upon similar pedes- tals near each other, and by aid of a mechanical device, called the pointing machine, holes are drilled into the marble of the .same depth as the depressions upon the surface of the model. The correspondence between the model and the block was f(uinerly indicated by a series of marks made upon each, which enabled the assistant to locate the holes to be drilled. But now a more e.xact device is used, consisting of a T-shaped instrument b.y means of which the three most ])roniinent points of the model are fi.xed upon the stone, and from these points others are gained by an elaborate similar process of triangulation. From the holes thus drilled a trained stonecutter (Kc(n-i>elliiio) rough-hews the stone, leaving only the completion for the sculptor. History. It is the purpose of this article to treat the development of modern as distin- guished from ancient sculpture. That of the Oriental peoples, whose art is principally deco- rative, has been treated under such heads as Ciiine.se Art; Japanese Art: Indian Art; that of the ancient peoples whose art is not connected with the general development under Egyptian, Babylonian, and Assyrian Art. Classic sculp- ture, which under the Greeks attained its most perfect development, is treated under Greek Art; Roman Art. That of the Middle Ages, which is entirely dependent upon architecture, is best treated under the chief luedia-val epochs. (See Christian, Romanesque, and CtOthic Art.) With the Italian Renaissance modein sculpture begins. With its emancipation from architecture the individual artist becomes of im- portance. It will be found convenient to treat this part of the subject under the two headings, 'the Renaissance' and 'Jlodem Sculpture.' The first includes the great revival of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, to which may be ap- pended the mannered art of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries as emanating from the same source. With the nineteenth century begins mod- ern art par excellence, achieving results most radically different from the ancient period. the sen.mssance. First Revival in Italy-. The chief revival of the art of sculpture, marking, indeed, the origin of Italian and through it of modern sculpture, occurred in Italy during the thirteenth century. There was a general revival in the peninsula, following classic models, with Southern Italy, Rome, and Pisa as the chief centres, of which only the latter was destined to prevail. (See Gothic Art.) Here the father of the art was Niccola Pisano (c.I206-c.l'280). In form and in subject his art is a continuation of Tuscan Ro- manesque, but differing from it in that its in- spiration was antique art. His models were late Roman reliefs and sarcophagi, which he imitated not only in figures and in style, but even in technique, as for example in the conspicuous use of the drill. The expression of the faces is se- rious and noble, and the treatment of the nude is surprisingly good, but the draperies are heavy and the composition is overcrowded. Of his pupils Arnolfo di Cambio, chiefly celebrated as an architect, and Guglielmo d'Agnolo followed his classical tendencies, but his son Giovanni Pisano