Relief Sculpture

Relief Sculpture

The Encyclopedia Brytanica defines relief sculpture as "Relief sculpture is a complex art form that combines many features of the two-dimensional pictorial arts and the three-dimensional sculptural arts. On the one hand, a relief, like a picture, is dependent on a supporting surface, and its composition must be extended in a plane in order to be visible. On the other hand, its three-dimensional properties are not merely represented…"

It is doubtful whether any principles of design are universal in the art of sculpture, for the principles that govern the organization of the elements of sculpture into expressive compositions differ from style to style. In fact, distinctions made among the major styles of sculpture are largely based on a recognition of differences in the principles of design

Bas-relief is a method of sculpting which entails carving or etching away the surface of a flat piece of stone or metal. The word is derived from the Italian basso rilievo, the literal translation meaning "low contrast" as opposed to "alto rilievo" ("high contrast"). To explain simply, it is a sculpture portrayed as a picture. The portrayed image is raised above the background flat surface. For example, if a stone slab is two inches thick before sculpting begins, the non-image (background) area may be one inch thick when the art work has been completed, and the image area will vary from one inch to two inches, depending on the final image. That would be considered to be "low relief" within the context of Bas-Relief. In a few major works of art, the actual human figure may have "near natural" depth, but still, the background is greatly flattened and is only a few inches behind the rounded figures. This might be characterized as "high bas-relief". The advantage of the natural contour of the figures allows the work to be viewed from many angles without distortion of the figures themselves, but the background depth is only suggested. There is a continuum of the bas relief technique into the next category, alto-relievo, or high relief. This technique combines the rounded figures with significantly deeper backgrounds. Instead of the backgrounds being a few inches deep, they may be a foot to several feet deep. To qualify as relief, of either kind, the sculpture figures must float out from the background. A good rule of thumb, to classify a work, might be that the "bas" technique always has less depth behind the faces or figures than the actual faces or figures would have, when measured. In "alto" technique, the depth behind the figures may equal or exceed the depth of the faces or figures, which are usually natura

Occasionally, free standing sculptures are set in front of a relief sculpture to deepen the scene. Only those figures that are supported by attachment to the vertical stone background are considered to be part of the "relief". Foreground sculptures may be part of the final "grouping", but not of the "relief" in depth.

Bas relief has existed in all civilizations creating stone sculpture from ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia India, and China, to classical, Middle Ages, and renaissance periods in European arts. A world wide use of this and the "alto" technique in public or political sculpture exists throughout the modern world. Bas-relief is an art technique that has been used since ancient times; the Elgin marbles are a prime example of this form of art. Stone Mountain is the world's largest bas-relief. The process is still in use today. There are countless examples both on display in museums and in the regular world. Most cultures of the world have utilized the technique.

Classical sculpture was forgotten for a thousand years and then revived again during the Italian Renaissance. One of the most important sculptors in the classical revival was Donatello. Many other sculptors such as Michelangelo also made works which can be considered classical. Modern Classicism contrasted in many ways with the classical sculpture of the 19th Century which was characterized by commitments to naturalism (Antoine-Louis Barye) -- the melodramatic (François Rude) sentimentality (Jean Baptiste Carpeaux) -- or a kind of stately grandiosity (Lord Leighton) Several different directions in the classical tradition were taken as the century turned, but the study of the live model and the post-Renaissance tradition was still fundamental to them.