Sculpture Synopsis 10: 19th Century

Brown, Ward, Hiolle

Post published:June 27, 2023

For more on the why and how of the Sculpture Synopsis, see the first post in this series. The series is also available as a playlist on my YouTube Channel. This is the final post of the series.

Characteristic examples

The major periods we’ve looked at, from Egyptian to Baroque, have had recognizable subjects and styles. In the 19th century, the most characteristic feature is the wide variety of subjects and styles, and the speed with which they change and spread.

Dates

From 1800 to 1900.

Timeline for 19th-century sculpture. Copyright © 2023 Dianne L. Durante

Location

France dominates 19th-century sculpture, in large part because the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, established in 1648, remains the best training institution for aspiring sculptors, including Americans.

Europe 1848-49. Historical map with main revolutionary centres, important reactionary troop movements, states with abdications and national conflicts. Image: Alexander Altenhof / Wikipedia

United States in 1850, after Compromise of 1850. Image: Golbez / Wikipedia

Dominant ideas

At the beginning of the 19th century, Enlightenment ideas dominate, including the assumption that reality exists independent of man’s mind, but that man can discover its nature by reason, observation and logic, and that he can improve his life by acting on that knowledge. These ideas lead to the scientific and technological achievements of the Industrial Revolution. In art, they lead to the assumption that artists should be trained to represent reality accurately. Hence Paris, the site of the centuries-old Ecole des Beaux-Arts, becomes a mecca for sculptors.
Over the course of the 19th century, the ideas of Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) become widely accepted not just among philosophers, but among intellectuals and the common man. Kant states that man cannot know reality because his senses distort any data they receive. If he knows reality at all, it can only be via non-rational means such as intuition, faith, or feelings. These ideas lead to major changes in artistic theory, including the ideas that training is unnecessary, that the creation of art is the province of emotion rather than reason, that style is more important than subject, and that there is no objective standard for judging art. For more on these changes, see my Seismic Shifts in Subject and Style: 19th-Century French Painting and Philosophy.

Media

Marble
Bronze

Note: improved machines for creating reproductions allow copies of sculptures at affordable prices. At Tiffany’s and other high-end stores, you can buy a reduced-size version of a major work for display in your own home.

Also: during the second half of the 19th century, sales of art shift from the annual Paris Salon (whose entries are vetted by conservative artists belonging to the French Academy) to small exhibitions or galleries, where artists can sell their works year round to an audience of collectors. This combined with the sale of reduced-size versions helps make sculptors less dependent for their income on commissions from the Church, royalty, and government.

Subjects

Subjects of 19th-c. sculpture include:

Portraits, ranging from lifesize busts to over-lifesize equestrian bronzes of military and political figures that are placed in public squares. By the end of the century, even relatively minor figures are commemorated this way. In New York City, more than fifty outdoor portrait sculptures are dedicated by 1900.

Allegorical figures (standing for abstract concepts such as liberty, justice, charity), symbolic figures, and mythological figures. This type of figure (as well as portraits) frequently stand in a new venue for sculpture: landscaped municipal cemeteries such as Père Lachaise in Paris, Forest Hills in Boston, and the Green-Wood in New York City. During the City Beautiful movement, which begins with the 1893 Columbian Exposition and runs into the 1920s, allegorical, symbolic, and mythological figures are widely used as architectural decoration.

Falguiere, Saint Gaudens, Bartholdi, Saint Gaudens, Strazza

Literary, historical, legendary figures such as Carpeaux’s Ugolino.
Studies of anonymous figures. (On the Marteleur, see here.)

Style

The dominant style of the late 18th century was Neoclassicism, which harks back to the calm, dignity, and beauty of Greek and Roman works. See, for example, Canova’s Perseus with the Head of Medusa. Neoclassicism is associated with the Enlightenment and reason. The early 19th century sees the rise of Romanticism, a reaction against the Neoclassical style. In sculpture, painting, music, and literature, Romanticism focuses on the individual and his emotions. It strives to arouse strong passions, whether positive or negative. (On the origin and leading figures of Romanticism, see my Seismic Shifts, Ch. 4.) Over the course of the 19th century, Romanticism and Neoclassicism continue and begin to merge.
The Industrial Revolution brings (among much else) a remarkable increase in rate of communication, via faster travel (steamships, railroads), near-instantaneous communication (telegraph, telephone), and cheap, fast printing with abundant illustrations. For art, this means that subjects and styles spread far more rapidly.
A remarkably high number of sculptors are trained at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts and other institutions, achieving high levels of technical ability with respect to anatomy, details, finish, etc.

Major innovations in this period

No major innovations, in the sense of new means by which the artist can make viewers stop, look, and think more intensely about his works. (See the introduction to Innovators in Sculpture for more on what I consider a major innovation.) Rodin introduces a major change, but not for the better: see next section.

Big names in art

Jean-Baptiste Carpeaux (1827-1875) is the leading sculptor in France, the country where most European and American sculptors are trained. See his The Dance and Ugolino, illustrated above under Characteristic Examples and Subjects.
Auguste Rodin (1840-1917) changes the terms of the discussion about what a sculpture should be and should do, by emphasizing style over content. “Others may say that art is emotion, inspiration. Those are only phrases, tales with which to amuse the ignorant. Sculpture is quite simply the art of depression and protuberance. There is no getting away from that.” (Quoted in Robert Goldwater and Marco Treves, eds., Artists on Art (1972), pp. 324-5; quote is undated.) For more on Rodin’s career and works, see Innovators in Sculpture, Ch. 12. Rodin’s The Thinker is shown under Characteristic Examples. There are museums devoted to Rodin in Philadelphia and Paris.

In the United States, which is just beginning to produce world-class artists in the late 19th century, the leading sculptors are:

Augustus Saint Gaudens (1848-1907), who creates the iconic images of Puritans, Abraham Lincoln, and many more. See his Diana and Adams Memorial above, under Subjects. See also this set of posts on the Saint Gaudens National Historic Site and my Artist-Entrepreneurs: Saint Gaudens, MacMonnies, and Parrish.
Daniel Chester French (1850-1931) becomes America’s leading sculptor after the death of Saint Gaudens. His most famous work is the seated Lincoln in the Lincoln Memorial in Washington. See French’s Millmore Memorial above, under Characteristic Examples, and this series of posts on Chesterwood, his home and studio.

Where to see the originals

Musée d’Orsay in Paris: French sculpture from 1848 to 1914. Works from 1847 and earlier are at the Louvre.
Metropolitan Museum of Art: especially good for American sculpture and Rodin.
In the United States, most of the outdoor sculpture in major cities and towns is 19th-century or later. For sculpture in New York City, see my books Outdoor Monuments of Manhattan and From Portraits to Puddles: New York Memorials from the Civil War to the World Trade Center Memorial.