The surfaces of the
statue should therefore be so modeled as to give us, in the imagination,
the pleasures that we get when we touch the living body. It is well
known that these touch values were destroyed by the neo-classicists
when they polished the surfaces of their statues. Such sculpture for
the eye only is almost as good when reproduced in an engraving that
preserves its visual quality, and is therefore lacking in complete
sculptural beauty. But no plane reproduction can replace the best
Greek, Italian, or French work.
The life of the statue should, however, be more than skin deep. We
should appreciate it through sensations of motion and strain as well
as through sight and touch, feeling the tenseness or relaxation of the
muscles and tendons beneath. We should move with its motion or rest
with its repose. And this does not mean that we should merely know
that an attitude of quiet or of motion is represented; we should
actually experience quiet or motion. In our own bodies sensations
corresponding to these should be awakened by the visual image of the
statue, yet should be fused with the latter, becoming for our perception
its, not ours, in accordance with the mechanism of _einfuhlung_
described in our fourth chapter. The light rhythmic motion of the
figures in Carpeaux's "Dance" should thrill in our own limbs, yet seem
to thrill in theirs.
Because it preserves the full three-dimensional presence of the body,
sculpture is, next to the drama, the most realistic of the arts.
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