Scandinavian Sculptors. Russian, Polish and American Sculptors.

Scandinavian Sculptors.

By far the greatest sculptor of classical revival was Bertel Thorwaldsen (1770-1844), Icelander by race, whose boyhood was spent at Copenhagen, and who settled in Rome in 1797, when Canova's fame was at its highest point. He produced an immense quantity of groups, single statues, and reliefs, chiefly Greek and Roman deities, many of which show more of the true spirit of antique art than has been attained by any other modern sculptor. His group of the Three Graces is for purity of form and sculpturesque simplicity far superior to that of the same subject by Canova. No sculptor's works have ever been exhibited as a whole in so perfect a manner as Thorwaldsen's; they are collected in a fine building which has been specially erected to contain them at Copenhagen; he is buried in the courtyard. The Swedish sculptors Tobias Sergell and Johann Bystrom belonged to the classic school; the latter followed in Thorwald-sen's footsteps. Another Swede named Fogelberg was famed chiefly for his sculptured subjects taken from Norse mythology. W. Bissen and Jerichau of Denmark have produced some able works,—the former a fine equestrian statue of Frederick VII. at Copenhagen, and the latter a very spirited and widely known group of a Man attacked by a Panther.





Russia, Poland, United States

Within recent years Russia, Poland, and other countries have produced many sculptors, most of whom belong to the modern German or French schools. Rome is still a favourite place of residence for the sculptors of all countries, but can hardly be said to possess a school of its own. The sculptors of America almost invariably study at one of the great European centres of plastic art, especially in Paris. Hiram Powers of Cincinnati, who produced one work of merit, a nude female figure, called the Greek Slave, exhibited in London in 1851, lived and worked in Florence. A number of living American sculptors now reside both there and in Rome.


Footnotes

570-3 See Eug. Plon, Vie de Thorwaldsen, Paris, 1867.

570-4 On Italian and Spanish sculpture, see Vasari, Trattato della Scultura, Florence, 156S, vol. i., and his Vite dei Pittori, &c., ed. Milanesi, Florence, 1880 ; Rumohr, Italienische Forschungen, Leipsic, 1827-31 ; Dohme, Kunst und Künstler Italiens, Leipsic, 1879 ; Perkins, Tuscan Sculptors, London (1865), Italian Sculptors (1868), and Hand-book of Italian Sculpture (1883) ; Robinson, Italian Sculpture, London, 1862 ; Gruner, Marmor - Bildwerke der Pisaner, Leipsic, 1858 ; Ferreri, L'Arco di S. Agostino, Pavia, 1832 ; Symonds, Renaissance in Italy, London, 1877, vol. iii. ; Crowe and Cavalcasene, Hist. of Painting in Italy, London, 1S66, vol. i. ; Selvatico, Arch. e Scultura in Venezia, Venice, 1847 ; Ricci, Storia dell' Arch, in Italia, Modena, 1857-60 ; Street (Arundel Society), Sepulchral Monuments of Italy, 1878 ; Gozzini, Monumenti Sepolcrali della Toscana, Florence, 1819 ; De Montault, La Sculpture Religieuse à Rome, Rome, 1870—a French edition (with improved text) of Tosi and Becchio, Monumenti Sacri di Roma, Rome, 1842 ; Cavallucci and Mounier, Les Della Robbia, Paris, 1884 ; Cicognara, Monumenti di Venezia, Venice, 1838-40 ; Burges and Didron, Iconographie des Chapitaux du Palais Ducal à Venise, Paris, 1857 ; Richter. " Sculpture of S. Mark's at Venice," Macmillan's Mag., June I880 ; Temanza, Vite degli Scultori Veneziani, Venice, 1778 ; Diedo and Zanotto, Monumenti di Venezia, Milan, 1839 ; Schulz, Denkmäler der Kunst in Unter-Italien, Dresden, 1860 ; Brinckmann, Die Sculptur von B. Cellini, Leipsic, 1867 ; Eug. Plon, Cellini, sa Vie, &c., Paris, 1882 ; Moses and Cicognara, Works of Canova, London, 1824-28 ; Piroli, Fontana, and others, a series of engraved Plates of Canova's Works, s. 1. et a. ; Giulliot, Les Artistes en Espagne, Paris, 1870 ; Carderera y Solano, Iconografia Española, Siglo XL-XVII., Madrid, 1855-64 ; Monumentos Arquitectónicos de España, published by the Spanish Government, 1859, and still in progress.





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