Appreciation of sculpture; a handbook by Russell Sturgis ... . our Plate XI whichis assumed to be an original work, no onewould now claim that the Medician Venusis other than a late copy of a lost original,that is, of one of those modifications of thefamous Aphrodite of Knidos, with whichantiquity seems to have been abundantlysupplied. The Venus of the Capitol is thestudy of a more mature person than theVenus of Milo, and this choice was evi-dently made with the very purpose of in-sisting upon the surface forms resultingfrom much greater plumpness of the view given in Plate XI
Appreciation of sculpture; a handbook by Russell Sturgis ... . our Plate XI whichis assumed to be an original work, no onewould now claim that the Medician Venusis other than a late copy of a lost original,that is, of one of those modifications of thefamous Aphrodite of Knidos, with whichantiquity seems to have been abundantlysupplied. The Venus of the Capitol is thestudy of a more mature person than theVenus of Milo, and this choice was evi-dently made with the very purpose of in-sisting upon the surface forms resultingfrom much greater plumpness of the view given in Plate XI hasbeen chosen from among several differentviews, that the half-tone print may preservethe singular elaboration of the statue, as inthe flattened surface of the lumbar region,and the singularly delicate gradations ofroundings and flattings which pass oneinto another over the whole surface of thebody from shoulders to thighs and againover the limbs from hip to ankle. Thestatue is placed (as every statue ought to be)on a revolving stand which turns with a[48]. Plate XI.—STATUE IN THK CAlITOLINE MUSEUM. CALLED (; VENUSOK THE CAIITOL. Greek Culmination and Decline touch of the finger applied to a strong cop-per knob. Standing in a chosen positionwith the light which has been found thepurest and strongest, the student can placehis statue at will, and there is infinitelygreat artistic pleasure to be got from thestudy of its carefully wrought forms, how-ever much one might prefer to have in thesame situation a statue with the virginalgrace of a piece of the time of Phidias, or apiece which might be thought the work ofPraxiteles or Skopas. Unfortunately thenude form was hardly studied in those daysof early refinement. The female figures ofthe Parthenon pediment are not even partlynude, nor is it certainly known that anystatue of this character exists of a periodearlier than the one which we are now con-sidering. We have seen reason to believethat if it is drapery we are thi
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, booksubjectsculpture, bookyear19
