Playing with Fire : European Terracotta Models, 1740 to 1840

by Draper, James David; Scherf, Guilhem

• ISBN13: 9780300101904
• ISBN10: 0300101902
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2004-01-11
• Publisher: Metropolitan Museum of Art

Summary

The Neoclassical period in Europe produced a host of gifted sculptors of whom it has sometimes been remarked that their clay models exhibit more spirit than their finished marbles. Sketches and models of terracotta (clay that has been baked for greater longevity) are much like drawings in offering extraordinary insights into the creative process. A pan-European practice, modeling was centered in Rome, site of the collections of antiquities that were the chief inspiration of artists.

Author Biography

Guilhem Scherf is Conservateur en Chef, Departement des Sculptures, Musee du Louvre, Paris.

Table of Contents

Directors' Forewords	vi
List of Lenders	viii
Acknowledgments	ix
Authors of the Catalogue	xii
``Terracotta is the concern of genius'': Connoisseurs and Collectors of Terracottas	2	(6)
Guilhem Scherf
Neoclassical Modeling in Its International Context	8	(6)
James David Draper
CATALOGUE
Sculptors and Their Methods	14	(56)
Visualizing the Modeler (cat. nos. 1--5)	20	(10)
Sketches, Models, Reductions, and Independent Works	30	(40)
Terracottas and Unfired Clay Works (cat. nos. 6--8)	32	(4)
Sketches and Models (cat. nos. 9--22)	36	(20)
Independent Works (cat. nos. 23--30)	56	(14)
The Sculptor's Training	70	(44)
Academic Exercises	75	(18)
Studies (cat. nos. 31--32)	76	(3)
Prizes (cat. nos. 33--38)	79	(10)
Morceaux de Reception (cat. nos. 39--40)	89	(4)
Reference to the Antique (cat. nos. 41--49)	93	(21)
Typologies	114	(60)
The Monument (cat. nos. 50--59)	118	(22)
Reliefs (cat. nos. 60--70)	140	(20)
Group Aesthetics: Men and Centaurs (cat. nos. 71--78)	160	(14)
Subjects from Fable and Myth	174	(54)
Arcadia, the Loves of the Gods, and Cupid (cat. nos. 79--95)	178	(30)
Heroes and Heroism (cat. nos. 96--108)	208	(20)
Some Leading Preoccupations	228	(73)
Great Men (cat. nos. 109--115)	232	(17)
Funerary Sculpture (cat. nos. 116--127)	249	(22)
Genre Sculpture (cat. nos. 128--133)	271	(13)
Religious Subjects (cat. nos. 134--142)	284	(17)
Artists' Biographies	301	(8)
Bibliography	309	(14)
Index	323	(5)
Photograph Credits	328