The best artist has that thought alone Which is contained within the marble shell; The sculptor's hand can only break read more

The best artist has that thought alone Which is contained within the marble shell; The sculptor's hand can only break the spell To free the figures slumbering in the stone

Sculpture is more than painting. It is greater
To raise the dead to life than to create
read more

Sculpture is more than painting. It is greater
To raise the dead to life than to create
Phantoms that seem to live.

A Mercury is not made out of any block of wood.
[Lat., Ex quovis ligno non fit Mercurius.]

A Mercury is not made out of any block of wood.
[Lat., Ex quovis ligno non fit Mercurius.]

So stands the statue that enchants the world,
So bending tries to veil the matchless boast,
The read more

So stands the statue that enchants the world,
So bending tries to veil the matchless boast,
The mingled beauties of exulting Greece.

Then marble, soften'd into life, grew warm.

Then marble, soften'd into life, grew warm.

I did my sculpture as a painter. I did not work as a sculptor.

I did my sculpture as a painter. I did not work as a sculptor.

Sculpture is more divine, and more like Nature,
That fashions all her works in high relief,
And read more

Sculpture is more divine, and more like Nature,
That fashions all her works in high relief,
And that is Sculpture. This vast ball, the Earth,
Was moulded out of clay, and baked in fire;
Men, women, and all animals that breathe
Are statues, and not paintings.

I choose a block of marble and chop off whatever I don't need.

I choose a block of marble and chop off whatever I don't need.

In sculpture did ever anybody call the Apollo a fancy piece? Or
say of the Laocoon how it might read more

In sculpture did ever anybody call the Apollo a fancy piece? Or
say of the Laocoon how it might be made difference? A
masterpiece of art has in the mind a fixed place in the chain of
being, as much as a plant or a crystal.