The history of sculpture is as old as the history of humankind and has appeared in almost every culture throughout the world. For more detailed consideration of the sculpture of non-Western cultures and nations, see individual articles by country, by style, by type, by artist, and by building or monument. Clay engravings have been found on the walls of caves inhabited by prehistoric peoples of the Gravettian period (c.21,000 BC; Dordogne, France); small fertility figures carved from limestone, such as the \TVenus of Willendorf\t (c.25,000 BC; Naturhistorisches Museum, Vienna), or modeled in terra-cotta (c.5750 BC; \TCatal Huyuk\t) have been found at other sites (see \Tprehistoric art\t). Carving, a direct subtractive process, is one of the two ancient \Tsculpture techniques\t. Carved or glyptic sculptures were fashioned from such durable materials as stone, ivory, and wood. The other technique is modeling, a direct additive process in which a pliable material is built up around an armature or skeletal framework. Casting, either by the \Tlost-wax process\t or in sand, is an indirect process (see \Tbronzes\t); a carved or a modeled sculpture is its starting point. Sculpture may be created in two dimensions--relief sculpture--or in three--in the round. Relief may be of varying degrees--low (called \Tbas-relief\t), middle, or high--depending on how far the figures emerge from the background plane; or forms may be recessed beneath the background plane, a method favored by the ancient Egyptians. EGYPTIAN SCULPTURE The Palette of King Narmer (c.3200 BC; Egyptian Museum, Cairo) is the oldest work to have been discovered in the pharaonic style of Egyptian sculpture (see \TEgyptian art and architecture\t). Its representational conventions, which emphasize authority, were followed, except for a few significant deviations, for 2,700 years until Hellenistic traits were adopted following Alexander the Great's conquest (332 BC) of Egypt. The only open rejection of the rigidities in frontal and lateral poses and gestures occurred during the reign (1375-1358 BC) of Akhenaten, as evidenced by a remarkably naturalistic portrait statue of him (c.1375 BC; Egyptian Museum). Following his death sculptors reverted to the ancient pharaonic tradition of representation. Under the later pharaohs the sculptural representations of the kings became colossal and imbued with awesome strength, such as the four immense statues of Ramses II that form the facade of his rock-cut temple (1257 BC) at \TAbu Simbel\t. Alongside the pharaonic tradition in sculpture stood another tradition, equally old but more naturalistic. It has survived for the most part in painted wood and limestone images of scribes, stewards, and other dignitaries, rendered to reveal their human qualities, as in the Seated Scribe (2750-2625 BC; Louvre, Paris), a painted limestone statuette with eyes of inlaid rock crystal. GREEK AND ROMAN SCULPTURE Until the 20th century, Greek and Roman sculpture was the most important and, except during the early Middle Ages, the most continuous influence on sculptors in the West. The Greco-Roman blend of realistically observed detail and ideally conceived form has profoundly affected the whole course of sculptural styles in the West. Aegean and Greek Sculpture Late Minoan and Mycenaean civilization (c.1600-200 BC; see \TAegean civilization\t), influenced by centuries of trade with Egypt and other Eastern Mediterranean centers, produced large-scale sculptures, such as the Lion Gate at \TMycenae\t (c.1300 BC). In reliefs and statuettes Minoan sculptors of the time revealed an interest in costume and the human physique, as shown in the ivory-and-gold snake goddess (c.1600 BC; Archaeological Museum, Iraklion, Crete), found at \TKnossos\t. These figurines are entirely different from the older, smoothly schematized marble figures (c.2500-2000 BC) from the Cycladic and other Greek islands (see \TCycladic art\t). In the Greek archaic period (c.660-480 BC), sculptors carved life-size nude kouroi (plural of kouros, a young man) and clothed korai (plural of kore, a young woman), such as the Kouros from Anavysos (c.540-515 BC; National Museum, Athens) and the Peplos Kore (c.540-530 BC; Acropolis Museum, Athens). In the classical period (480-330 BC), especially in the earliest phase (until 430 BC), sculpture was carved in a severe (or formal) classical style. The male body became a broad-shouldered, trim-hipped athlete, often shown in arrested motion, as in Myron's bronze Discobolus (c.460-450 BC), which survives only in Roman marble copies. The female figures were still severely draped; the earlier archaic smiles were sometimes softened in expression. Later, in high classicism, such sculptors as \TPraxiteles\t added suppleness and grace to sculpture of the nude female form, as in his marble Aphrodite of Cnidus (c.350-330 BC), known from innumerable Roman copies. The subtle, twisted pose, called contrapposto, of his statues was much copied and can be seen effectively in his Hermes Holding the Infant Dionysus (c.350-330 BC; Museum, Olympia). In the Hellenistic period (330-100 BC), sculptors showed a growing interest in the depiction of violent motion and emotion, as in the Borghese Warrior (1st century BC; Louvre, Paris), and in the effects of time, as in the bronze Boxer (2d or 1st century BC; Museo delle Terme, Rome). One of the great monumental groups of late Hellenistic sculpture, the Laocoon (c.175-150 BC; Vatican Museums), rediscovered (1506) in Rome, had a profound impact on Italian Renaissance sculpture (see \TGreek art\t). Etruscan and Roman Sculpture Because the Romans assimilated competing Italic cultures efficiently and ruthlessly, comparatively little survives of the sculpture of their longtime rivals, the \TEtruscans\t. Some terra-cotta figures, many associated with sarcophagi, suggest a strong archaic Greek influence on Etruscan culture, as does the Apollo of Veii (c.510 BC; Museo Nazionale di Villa Giulia, Rome). Some ornamental bronzes from Etruscan tombs, such as the figures on the lid of the Ficoroni Cista (c.350 BC; Museo Nazionale di Villa Giulia), are classical in feeling and may have been made in Rome, although they were found in an Etruscan tomb. In Rome during preimperial times, patrician ancestral images, either as busts or full figures--such as the bronze Capitoline Brutus (3d century BC; Palazzo dei Conservatori, Rome)--were exceedingly popular; their extreme realism established a veristic tradition in Roman portrait sculpture. This verism is evident even in the classical reliefs that adorn the elaborate Ara Pacis (Altar of Peace; 13-9 BC; Lungotevere in Augusta, Rome), erected by Emperor Augustus to commemorate his victories in Gaul and Spain. As in earlier cultures monumental sculpture became an indispensable tool of imperial propaganda. Two distinctively Roman architectural forms, the triumphal column and the \Ttriumphal arch\t, were adorned with relief sculpture, and both have had long subsequent histories as models for other cultures. In Rome the Column of Trajan (AD 112-13) and the Column of Marcus Aurelius (AD c.181) survive relatively intact, as do the Arch of Titus (AD 81) and the Arch of Constantine (AD c.315). Another form of Roman imperial glorification was the monumental equestrian statue. Only one Roman example has survived, and that through mistaken identity. The gilded bronze equestrian monument of Marcus Aurelius (AD c.165; Piazza del Campidoglio, Rome), was thought by early Christians to represent Constantine I, who made Christianity the official state religion. During the Renaissance this group became the model used by several sculptors to portray victorious condottieri (professional soldiers) on horseback, for example, Donatello's Gattamelata (1445-50; Piazza del Santo, Padua) and Verrocchio's Colleoni (1481-96; Campo Santissimi Giovanni e Paolo, Venice). At death important people were placed in sarcophagi (see \Tsarcophagus\t), the front and sides of which were often carved in high relief. The Seasons Sarcophagus (AD 220-30; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City) conveys in a Hellenistic style a typical message of the late imperial age: the seasons pass in abundance; life, for the fortunate, is an eternal feast. In the 3d century, imperial sculpture began to lose its classicistic-naturalistic balance, first in favor of strong verism and later of a compact bulkiness, in a style called Late Antique. Modeling became perfunctory and details were shallowly incised, as in the porphyry group now called The Tetrarchs (late 3d-early 4th century; Saint Mark's Church, Venice). After Constantine I seized power, imperial sculpture once again became monumental. In a colossal head of Constantine (c.313; Palazzo dei Conservatori), the facial planes are blocklike, the hair is a schematic cap, and the bulging eyes, with off-center pupils, are set in a gaze heavenward (see \TRoman art and architecture\t). EARLY CHRISTIAN AND BYZANTINE SCULPTURE After the shift of the empire's administrative center (AD 330) from Rome to Constantinople, official interest in monumental sculpture declined. Large sculptures in the round were viewed as idolatrous by the early Christians. On a small scale, carving in relief continued on diptychs (portable ivory panels), such as the Diptych of Justinian (527; Louvre, Paris) and Saint Michael the Archangel (519-27; British Museum, London). In the West high relief work continued to be carved on the sides of sarcophagi, modified so that figures from pagan mythology either disappeared or were adapted as Christian images and symbols, such as the beardless Christ on the Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus (c.359; Vatican Grottoes, Rome). CAROLINGIAN, OTTONIAN, AND ROMANESQUE SCULPTURE The strenuous efforts of the first Holy Roman emperor, Charlemagne (r. 800-14), to refound the Roman Empire in the West led to a general revival in the arts (see \TCarolingian art and architecture\t). For his Palace Chapel at Aachen, Charlemagne commissioned eight bronze grille screens for the octagonal structure. Executed between 795 and 810, each grille is cast in a single piece of extraordinary delicacy, inspired by the pierced marble screens used in Roman churches. Later, under Otto III, Bishop Bernward (fl. 993-1022) of Hildesheim commissioned a pair of monumental bronze doors ornamented with biblical scenes; each door was cast in a single piece. They remain in the monastery Church of Saint Michael in Hildesheim, and they were the first large-scale castings in more than 500 years (see \TOttonian art and architecture\t). In the West stone carving gradually revived and first appeared in the form of religious narratives on the piers and tympana (see \Ttympanum\t), semicircular spaces above the main church portals. The models for these large sculptures seem to have been figures from ivory diptychs and manuscript illuminations, treasures that were slowly disseminated westward and northward from Byzantium and its colonial outposts in the Mediterranean. A well-preserved example is the tympanum The Second Coming of Christ (1110-20; south portal) at the Church of Saint Pierre in Moissac, France. One of the most classicistic works to have survived from this period is the large brass baptismal font (1107-18) attributed to Reiner de Huy at the Church of Saint Barthelemy, Liege, France (see \TRomanesque art and architecture\t). GOTHIC SCULPTURE France and Germany The great Royal Portal (c.1150-70) at \TChartres Cathedral\t in France, whose tympana depict, from left to right, the Ascension, the Apocalypse, and the Incarnation of Christ, with columnar figures forming the door jambs below, is a transitional monument, with Romanesque features in an emphatic Gothic framework (see \TGothic art and architecture\t). Regional and national differences made themselves felt as sculpture became less unbendingly columnar and more supple and expressive, as in the two groups, the Annunciation (c.1220) and the Visitation (c.1230-40), on the west facade of \TReims Cathedral\t in France. In Germany emphasis was placed on capturing what was personal and particular. The unknown sculptor of the freestanding figures of Ekkehard and Uta (c.1260-70) in the west choir of Naumburg Cathedral treated the cloaked figures in a simple, monumental fashion although rendering the heads in a powerful, expressive manner. The same sense of a distinctive personality is conveyed by the head and figure of the Bamberg Rider (c.1230-40) in Bamberg Cathedral, the first monumental equestrian group since that of Marcus Aurelius. The Netherlandish master Claus \TSluter\t, commissioned by the art-loving Duke of Burgundy, carved six life-size figures of prophets--including a dynamic Moses--for the so-called Well of Moses (1395-1404) in the Chartreuse de Champmol, Dijon, France, in an extreme and expressive Late Gothic style. Italy Imported from the North, the Gothic style was invariably tempered in the hands of Italian sculptors by the native classical sources around them. At the same time, individual sculptors clearly impressed their own individual personalities on works they did for churches. Italian Gothic sculpture, which was on a smaller scale than that beyond the Alps, was more often used to ornament pulpits than tympana and piers. Italian sculptors charged biblical narratives with more motion and emotion than did the sculptors of the North. The hexagonal pulpit (1260) by Nicola Pisano (see \TPisano, Nicola and Giovanni\t) in the Baptistery of Pisa is clearly a descendant of Hellenistic sarcophagi, as can be seen in the narrative panels and the nude Hercules figure representing Fortitude. The same is true of the pulpit (1302-10) by his son Giovanni for the adjacent Cathedral of Pisa, with large figures carved in the round supporting the pulpit platform. RENAISSANCE AND MANNERIST SCULPTURE Italy Three sculptors typify Early Renaissance sculpture in Italy: the Sienese Jacopo della \TQuercia\t and the Florentines \TDonatello\t and Lorenzo \TGhiberti\t. Della Quercia's masterpiece is the set of 14 marble relief panels (1425-38) of biblical scenes in the central portal of the Church of San Pietro, Bologna, in which dramatic intensity is conveyed through the taut composition of the beautifully carved figures. Donatello, in the Gattamelata mentioned previously and in his bronze David (c.1440-42; Bargello, Florence), revived two major Roman forms singlehandedly--the monumental equestrian statue and the heroic male nude. Ghiberti, in the Gates of Paradise (1425-52; East Doors of the Baptistery, Florence), fused classical art and Renaissance humanism: the 10 gilded bronze panels and their surrounding borders depict biblical scenes with every possible variation of relief sculpture. The complete mastery of the mature male form and the peak of High Renaissance sculpture was reached in \TMichelangelo\t's colossal David (1501-03; Accademia, Florence). His four unfinished Slaves (c.1532; Accademia) seem to struggle tortuously to emerge from the marble blocks. In pursuing the classical ideal of beautiful and harmonious proportions, sculptors as well as painters strove to achieve distinctive and extraordinary effects. This emphasis on invention led to elaboration of certain parts of the body--elongation of the neck, hands, thighs, or all three--and to writhing sinuosities of pose, all characteristic of \TMannerism\t. In sculpture the beginnings of this Mannerist tendency can be found in Benvenuto \TCellini\t's bronze Perseus (1545-54; Loggia dei Lanzi, Florence) and reaches a culmination in some of the works of Giovanni da \TBologna\t, especially the corkscrew twistings of his marble Rape of the Sabine Woman (1583; Loggia dei Lanzi). France The Italian Renaissance style in sculpture was carried to France by Cellini, who worked in the court of Francis I. The Italian master strongly influenced an entire generation of French artists, including Jean \TGoujon\t, who was notable as a sculptor of elegant Mannerist reliefs with strong classical tendencies. Goujon's elongated and smoothly curved nymphs in fluid poses survive in five relief panels on his Parisian Fontaine des Innocents (1547-49); altered subsequently. BAROQUE AND ROCOCO SCULPTURE Italy Whereas the Renaissance ideal was the proper balance of separately perfect parts, that of the baroque age, which began in Rome in the 1580s, was the orchestration of perfect balances into larger entities. Characteristically, baroque sculpture is designed to arrest the eye first and then to lead it (and the spirit of the spectator) gradually upward through balanced complexities to a single climactic point (see \Tbaroque art and architecture\t). In sculpture, Giovanni Lorenzo \TBernini\t's works best exemplify this ideal, especially his Ecstasy of Saint Teresa (1645-52; Cornaro Chapel, Santa Maria della Vittoria, Rome). Space, color, and chiaroscuro all work together to overwhelm the viewer. The focal point, the recumbent figure of the saint and the angel carrying a golden arrow, are flooded with light from a concealed source above them. The two figures, however, are only points of departure for the unified aesthetic effect of the entire chapel, which is adorned with marble inlays, trompe-l'oeil paintings and mosaics, and sculptured spectators at either side. France Rococo sculpture and architecture developed in France after the death (1715) of Louis XIV. Sculptors in the \Trococo style\t abandoned the strong architectonic balances of the baroque in favor of asymmetrical detail. The greatest triumphs of the rococo were in architectural decoration and ornamental carving. Germany Italian baroque and French rococo were merged in Germany to produce sumptuous architectural works clad in shimmering carved and painted detail. Its greatest triumphs were in a union of architecture, carving, and painting in churches and palaces by such artists as the \TAsam brothers\t, Francois \TCuvillies\t, Johann Balthasar \TNeumann\t, and Jakob \TPrandtauer\t. Sculptors, painters, and architects made equal contributions to the creation of brilliant, unified effects. NEOCLASSICAL SCULPTURE The neoclassical style (see \Tneoclassicism\t, art) began in Rome in the 1750s with the archaeological researches of Johann Joachim \TWinckelmann\t, who sharply distinguished Greek classical art, which he praised, from Roman classical art, which he denounced. Antonio \TCanova\t, whose foremost patrons were Napoleon Bonaparte and his family, was one of several influential sculptors who dominated the neoclassical movement, which became international in scope from the 1790s to the end of the Victorian era. Bertel \TThorvaldsen\t in Italy and Denmark, John \TFlaxman\t in England, Jean Antoine \THoudon\t in France, and Horatio \TGreenough\t and Hiram \TPowers\t in the United States produced many popular sculptures in the neoclassical style. The French 19th-century sculptors Francois \TRude\t, Antoine Louis \TBarye\t, and Jean Baptiste \TCarpeaux\t, working in a romantic style (see \Tromanticism\t, art), created sculpture of surpassing quality in an age that preferred empty academic or cloying sentimental sculptural wares. Auguste Rodin The late-19th-century French sculptor Auguste \TRodin\t exploited all aspects of classical sculpture. In his art, Rodin was not so much a shaper of 20th-century developments as he was a sculptor who shred neoclassicism of its sentimentality and its disguised eroticism. His carved marble sculptures are imbued with sexual intensity; his bronze busts project the strong personalities of many famous contemporaries; and his monumental sculptures are overwhelming in their balance of mass and form. This concern for monumentality is reflected in the work of his gifted pupil Emile Antoine \TBourdelle\t. TWENTIETH-CENTURY SCULPTURE During the 20th century, sculpture underwent the most radical changes in its history. The emergence of \Tcubism\t and \Tabstract art\t brought down the dominance of Greek and Roman principles of ideal form and realistic detail. Representational sculpture, continuing under the influence of such late-19th-century artists as Rodin, Augustus \TSaint-Gaudens\t, and Medardo \TRosso\t, remained the primary mode of expression for numerous sculptors. The Scandinavians Carl \TMilles\t and Gustav \TVigeland\t, the French Aristide \TMaillol\t and Henri \TMatisse\t, the Germans Ernst \TBarlach\t and Wilhelm \LLehmbruc\lh, and the Polish-American Elie \TNadelman\t all continued figural representation within their national and stylistic traditions, many of them variants of \Texpressionism\t. Georges \TBraque\t and Pablo \TPicasso\t applied to sculpture the cubist theories they had invented, with such sculptors as Aleksandr \TArchipenko\t, Raymond \TDuchamp-Villon\t, and Jacques \TLipchitz\t following their lead. Other revolutionary movements followed: Italian \Tfuturism\t, exemplified by the work of Umberto \TBoccioni\t; Russian \Tconstructivism\t, established by Vladimir \TTatlin\t and perpetuated by the brothers Naum \TGabo\t (Pevsner) and Antoine \TPevsner\t; \TDada\t, with "found objects" by Marcel \TDuchamp\t; \Tsurrealism\t, as in the disparate works of Max \TErnst\t, Alberto \TGiacometti\t, and Man \Tray\t; and the biomorphic abstractions of Jean \TArp\t and Constantin \TBrancusi\t. The English sculptor Henry \TMoore\t, inspired by ancient art, pursued his own course toward a monumental balance between abstraction and representation. Sculpture since World War II has become whatever the artist wishes it to be. The advent of \Tabstract expressionism\t and the rise of New York City as the world's artistic center has led to a proliferation of movements, such as \Tconceptual art\t, \Tearthworks\t, \Tenvironmental art\t, \Tkinetic art\t, \Tminimal art\t, and \Tpop art\t. At the same time, frank realism has emerged, personified by George \TSegal\t's roughly cast plaster figures in actual settings, \TMarisol\t's sharply satirical blocky figures, and the three-dimensional comic environments of Red \TGrooms\t. The abstract metal sculptures of David \TSmith\t, however, are considered by many to be among the most important creations in postwar art and have had a pervasive influence on other sculptors. Bibliography: Auerbach, Arnold, Sculpture: A History in Brief (1952); Bazin, Germain, The History of World Sculpture, trans. by Madeline Jay (1968); Busch, Harald, and Lohse, Bernd, eds., Baroque Sculpture (1965) and Gothic Sculpture (1963); Cheney, Sheldon, Sculpture of the World: A History (1968); Gilbert, Creighton, History of Renaissance Art (1973); Hammacher, A. M., The Evolution of Modern Sculpture (1969); Koepf, Hans, Masterpieces of Sculpture (1966); Lange, Kurt, and Hirmer, Max, Egypt: Architecture, Sculpture, Painting in Three Thousand Years, 4th ed. (1968); Pope-Hennessy, John, Italian Renaissance Sculpture, 2d ed. (1971); Rice, D. Talbot, Art of the Byzantine Era (1963); Richter, Gisela M., A Handbook of Greek Art, 2d ed. (1977); Selz, Jean, Modern Sculpture (1963); Strong, Donald, Roman Art (1976); Swarzenski, H. P., Monuments of Romanesque Art, 2d ed. (1967); Wittkower, Rudolf, Sculpture: Processes and Principles (1977). See also: \Tarchitecture\t; \Tart\t.