MART-701 Lessons

"What do you call an owl that can speak to packages?”

“Um, I’m not sure,” replied a confused Third Year Gryffindor who was staring at the overly excited gargoyle in front of him.

“How could you not know? The answer’s right there. It’s a parcel tongue,” replied a rather sarcastic gargoyle a few feet away. The student groaned in reply while the gargoyle who made the original joke proceeded to bicker with the other gargoyle over ruining their joke. The slightly confused, but entertained, student left the gargoyles to their own devices and joined the other students in the courtyard who were traveling to their next course. The gargoyles were not the only lively works of art in the castle today. Many of the sculptures and statues on Hogwarts property seemed unusually more energetic than normal, especially those near the fourth floor, who appeared to be gossiping amongst one another. The subject of the gossip may be ever more apparent the closer one got to the Magical Art classroom as a conversation could be overhead.

“Why are you always involving me with your shenanigans? No matter how many times you ask, I will not give a testimony to your class as the ‘real’ Paracelsus. I’m just a head!” exclaimed an exasperated bust of Paracelsus, who may or may not have been dragged to the Magical Art classroom from the Library corridor. 

“Now, now, calm down. We aren’t even in the Alchemy Lab. If you would stop protesting and look around, you would notice that we are in my Magical Art class,” Professor Rosenquist replied nonchalantly. The bust fell silent in his complaints as he observed the room and the students filing in.

“Quite interesting. I presume you require my assistance and expertise since I am good friends with Michelangelo,” chimed the bust of Paracelsus confidently. 

“Why no, we are discussing sculptures today, and you— Wait, what? Really?” the professor did a double take at the bust. 

“No of course not, dear Serafina. I am, in fact, a statue,” Paracelsus replied with a smirk. Professor Rosenquist glared at the bust and grumbled something about bringing Boris the Bewildered instead before turning around to address her amused students.

Hello class. Please ignore the babbling imitation of the great alchemist Paracelsus behind me. I am sure many of you are aware that today our lesson is on sculpture and that my attempts of having a rather unusual guest may have also excited the other sculptures on Hogwarts’ grounds. I do encourage you to take some time after the lesson today to observe the animation and behavior of the pieces, especially while they are still active! Speaking of the lesson, let’s get to it!

I would like all of you to ponder the following question for a few seconds: What is sculpture? How do we define this art form? We have mentioned a few different sculptures in the past in regards to art history, portraiture, and pottery. Perhaps a few pieces that we have discussed previously are coming to mind such as the Salem Memorial, or maybe even sculptures around the castle like the gargoyle that guards Headmistress Oshiro’s office. You may be thinking, given your previous exposure to the art form, that sculpture is purely a three-dimensional figural art form. You would be correct if we were sitting in this room a little more than two centuries ago, but with the advancement of modern art, that isn’t the case anymore. Movements such as Abstract Expressionism and Minimalism have elevated and changed the art. Modernism has even gone beyond the use of traditional materials (stone, metal, ceramics, and wood) and processes (carving and modeling). For now, let’s define sculpture as “the art of expressing representative or abstract concepts in the three-dimensional form.”

Under that definition, think about what types of art are classified as sculpture. Obviously statues and busts fall into this category and, of course, as we mentioned in the last lesson, so do some ceramics. What about monuments, figurative tombs, altarpieces, carvings, or architectural reliefs? They actually fall under the gigantic sculpture umbrella as well! Traditionally, there were two categories of sculptures: those that were in the round and reliefs. 

“In the round” specifically referred to a free-standing sculpture, meaning that it was not attached to any other surface with the exception of the base. An example of one would be the Fountain of Magical Brethren at the Ministry of Magic. Every time I am there on business for the Department of Magical Games and Sports, I take a moment to marvel at it. It’s quite breathtaking! Meanwhile, reliefs refer to sculpture that is at least partly attached to a surface, and of course there are different classifications of reliefs depending on the degree of projection from said surface. Low relief, or bas-relief (pronounced bah-relief), refers to a shallow overall depth and is mainly meant to be viewed from the front. A good example of low relief is the image on our own currency. Yes, that dragon on the Galleon is actually a relief sculpture! On the flip side, high relief, or alto-relief, is when more than half of the mass of the sculpture is projected from the background. It involves a deeper level of definition because more material has been removed from the surface. A famous example of high relief sculpture is Mount Rushmore in the United States (pictured on the left). This monument depicts the faces of past U.S. presidents. Notice how pronounced each face is, how far the features are from the surface of the mountain. This piece is also considered a rock relief, which just refers to sculpture that is carved into a “living rock” like a mountain or cliff, rather than a separate piece of stone.

Of course, as mentioned earlier, with the arrival of modern art, sculpture is no longer limited to these two categories. Many abstract sculptures do still follow the normal model of being free-standing or relief, but there are also sculptures made from non-traditional mediums such as light or sound. Before we delve deeper into this phenomenon, let’s rewind and discuss how we got there.

What makes sculpture so fascinating is not only because its origins date back to prehistoric times, but also because we have surviving proof of exactly that! Due to the materials that traditional sculptures were made out of, they are the most durable art form, followed by pottery. Most prehistoric sculptures are small, portable, and typically made out of materials such as bone, clay, ivory, or limestone. The two potentially oldest existing sculptures are both Venus figurines, which are Upper Paleolithic effigies in the round that each portray a woman, more specifically, a possible fertility deity. While it’s frequently disputed by historians which one is the oldest (or if they are truly as old as they are believed to be), the Venus of Tan-Tan (left) is believed to be the oldest at 300,000 to  500,000 years old, followed by the Venus of Berekhat Ram (right) which is estimated to be approximately 230,000 to 280,000 years old. Some sources argue that the Venus of Berekhat Ram actually could be 800,000 years old, but nevertheless, ages of statuettes aside, both are the earliest depictions of the human form. These two sculptures eventually inspired a later sculpture called the Venus of Willendorf. This 11 cm (4 in) limestone sculpture from roughly 25,000 to 30,000 B.C.E. is quite arguably the most famous in the array of Venus figurines, and its surviving features show how the Venus of Tan-Tan and the Venus of Berekhat Ram may have looked in their prime. 

We can’t talk about prehistoric sculpture without mentioning the Lion-Human of Hohlenstein-Stadel, also known as Löwenmensch. Although there is some dispute about the actual age of the two Venus figurines above, this wooly mammoth ivory statue of a lion-man found in southern Germany holds the current undisputed title of oldest sculpture, dating back to 30,000 B.C.E. Löwenmensch is the oldest example of figurativism that we currently have, and according to some art historians and archaeologists, this statue is also the oldest representation of religion; it is believed to have been rubbed and passed around as part of a ritual as evidenced by its worn appearance. Magihistorians have even theorized that the artist may have somehow caught a glimpse of either a chimera or a sphinx and interpreted the creature as a bipedal humanoid. If their deductions are correct, we may have a sculpture depicting a magical creature even earlier than the Great Sphinx of Giza on our hands!

 

Left: Venus of Willendorf - Right: Löwenmensch

From the reliefs in Turkey at Gobekli Tepe (which we went over in Year Six), to bronze statuettes in the Indus Valley Civilization, to free-standing sculpture of Pre-Columbian art in the Americas, the art of sculpture was blossoming on its own in pretty much any ancient civilization that you can think of. Arguably the most impressive examples of sculpture at the time hail from ancient Egypt. The construction of pyramids increased the demand for additional statues and reliefs. How else are you supposed to show respect for the various pharaohs in the afterlife if you don’t depict them in all their glory? Special burial sculptures are said to have housed the ka portion of the person’s soul. Some of these small statues were enchanted by ancient Egyptian wizards in the belief that it would aid their loved one’s soul in reaching the afterlife; others were hexed to punish those who have come to disturb and rob the dead. You may also notice when looking at various Egyptian sculptures that they are all very consistent in style despite having different artists. This is because the Egyptians had very strict conventions for sculpture. For example, figures always faced forward, statues were formal and upright, depictions of men were darker than their female counterparts, seated statues were required to have their hands on their knees, and statues of gods had extremely specific rules that governed their appearance (i.e. Horus and Anubis have to have falcon and jackal heads respectively). Egyptian artwork was ranked by how well the art adhered to these conventions, and due to this, the style underwent little to no changes over 3,000 years.

But, of course, all things do eventually come to an end. As you may remember from our lesson on portraiture in Year Six, the pharaoh Akhenaten demanded artists depict figures more realistically, but artists at the time considered this shift in style to be too eccentric. This period of Egyptian art was called Amarna art and although it didn’t last long (there is no official record of when this style fell out of favor, but art reverted back to the pre-Amarna style by the reign of King Tutankhamun), it is an important era in the evolution of sculpture. It was the first time in Egyptian art that figures had movement and activity, scenes were busy, and everything wasn’t upright and formal. Amarna sculpture in particular saw the emphasis of certain body features such as enlarging the ears, lips, chin, thighs, stomach, and hips while narrowing the head, neck, arms, and calves. This was also the era where a third type of relief emerged in popularity called sunken relief. Sunken relief is where a sculpture is carved into a wall and it never rises past the original flat surface. Natural sunlight enhances the artwork by emphasizing outlines and forms with shadows, making it very popular for reliefs on external walls. It is almost completely exclusive to ancient Egyptian art, and even though it was occasionally used before the Amarna era, it became the dominant relief form during this time as it minimized the work of removing the entire background like other reliefs.

While I could go on all day about sculpture from different areas of the world, let’s recenter our focus back on Europe for time’s sake. The Classical era (510-323 B.C.E.) of ancient Greece was a notable shift in the artform. Sculpture was starting to take on a more naturalistic approach with poses becoming more lifelike. That being said, although the artwork was more realistic than older sculptures, it was still idealistic, as most art subjects were deities or people whose imperfections were omitted. You may recall - again from the portraiture lesson in Year Six - that this was the first use of contrapposto, which is when the figure shifts most of its weight onto one foot, rather than standing upright and stiff like the ancient Egyptian statues. The Greeks also honed in on creating realism and dynamism through their statuary, as shown in Myron’s Discobolus (left). Decorative reliefs on architecture called friezes were also very common as well as sculptures in the round that filled pediments (the triangular area between the tops of walls and the roof) on buildings. 

You may also remember the tale of Pygmalion that I had mentioned last year. Let’s delve more into that. So, the Classical era of ancient Greece saw a flourish of incorporating magic into sculpture. This was when magical sculpture began to be enchanted to recite dialogue. Basic animation in free-standing sculpture was slowly introduced but definitely not perfected. The Greeks had also run into the issue of attempting to animate reliefs but not knowing how to keep the background from also moving with the relief. Probably the most well known of these talking statues were several variations of sculptures of the nine muses from Greek mythology. These sets of sculptures were charmed to sing a song chosen by the sculptor, and some were complex enough to give each muse a different verse and have them harmonize during the chorus, rather than sing in unison. Oftentimes the charm was activated by the viewer reciting either “Sing, O Muse” or “Sing, Goddess,” depending on which set of the nine muses they were at. Not too many of these have survived until the present day, but there is a life-size set at the Greek Ministry of Magic. Granted, as much as this was a huge accomplishment at the time, the animations were not as natural as Greek artists hoped for. 

This unnatural movement of these animations was what inspired Pygmalion - a Cypriot king, wizard, and sculptor - to create a statue that was so lifelike that it would be indistinguishable from a person. He realized that the lips needed to be charmed independently from the face so that the talking animation would be more realistic. In that realization, Pygmalion wondered if that idea of independently charming specific body parts could be applied to the rest of the body. After multiple layers of various charm forms and spells, he created a statue that looked, moved, and acted like a real person. He named his creation Galatea. Unfortunately, the statue was not technically a sentient being because, as we know, art at that level of animation, which is nearly free thinking, is actually just a reflection of what the artist knows of the subject. Even more unfortunate was that Pygmalion fell in love with his creation, which spurred a myth that he married Galatea and had a child with the sculpture. This tale later inspired one of many stories in the poem, Metamorphoses, created by the Roman poet Ovid who was a Muggle. The poem tells the tale through the lens of Roman mythology where Venus (also known as Aphrodite) brought the statue to life, as that was a way that Muggles were able to fathom this complex type of magic at the time. All in all, in regards to magic, the Greeks walked so Pygmalion, and later the Romans, could run.

Speaking of the Romans, they truly strove for realism with their sculpture, imperfections and all. There is crossover between Greek and early Roman art, as a lot of their sculpture was heavily influenced by Greek dynamism and the style of Hellenistic art, but eventually they developed a distinct Italian style with a strong emphasis in portraiture. Although they did have sculptures in the round, most works were reliefs carved on architecture and busts. The Romans also perfected animation of sculpture, including reliefs. While the carved out portions weren’t able to fully separate from the background, they were able to move limbs, turn body parts, and walk around anywhere on the surface. This breathed life into artwork, and magical artists used this to help tell the narrative tales that their pieces were portraying. For instance, when animated, this relief entitled “Battle of the Romans and Barbarians” depicts the chaos of war in action, with weapons and limbs swinging about, but the figures would never fully detach from the crowded surface they are on. Once again, all things must come to an end, and the introduction of Christianity to the Roman Empire in 325 C.E. caused the loss of the knowledge of these enchantments for centuries as well as a change in artistic style. Figures became stumpy with large eyes, and the trend shifted towards religious iconography, idealization, and stylization.

This setback in realism and magic unfortunately did not recover until the late Medieval (when Pygmalion’s spells were rediscovered) and Renaissance period. Magical artists including Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo honed in again on realism and creating spells that would give similar results - but weren’t as complex - as Pygmalion’s. Records from various magical Renaissance artists note that sculptures were, in fact, much easier to animate than paintings. Why is that? Well, for one, sculptures already exist in three dimensions – the same dimensions that we live and move in – whereas paintings are two-dimensional. Sculptures are able to be made to move forward, backward, left, right, up, down, and in circles. Free-standing sculptures especially are separate from their surroundings, much like how we aren’t attached to ours, so it is easy to target them without having to worry about affecting the air, the ground, or the surface it may be sitting on. Reliefs are a bit different in the sense that the depth of the carving affects how well the sculpture moves in particular directions. High reliefs move better outwards, towards the viewer, since they are raised pretty far from their surface, but they have trouble moving side to side as they will collide with other figures and objects in their sculpture. Low reliefs move better side to side since they are much closer to their surface and the material can be easily transfigured to lower and rise when figures are sliding by each other, but they don’t have as much material to extend outwards with. Even with those limitations, they are still easier to enchant than paintings due to the fact that most angles in sculptures are accounted for and carved out already. In paintings, not every angle, fold, crease, or body part is exactly shown. For example, a painting showing a side profile of the subject from the shoulders up does not have the other side of their head or body painted, nor the rest of their body from the shoulders down. When enchanting the subject to move, the artist has to imagine what all those missing details may look like to give the subject full range of motion within their painting. Furthermore, even a low relief sculpture has the option of extending outwards towards the viewer while a figure in a painting is confined behind the surface of the canvas.

As with every art form, there are different techniques used for sculpture; however, unlike other art forms, the materials that you choose can largely influence which technique is used. The four main techniques for traditional sculpture are casting, modeling, assembly, and carving. Some of these may sound familiar to you and that’s because there is some overlap with other art forms! Casting in particular we learned about in our lesson on metalworking, and our example in that lesson was actually of a sculpture being created. In regards to sculpture, materials used in casting are typically metals like aluminum, bronze, copper, gold, and iron, but wax and glass are popular options as well. One local example of this is the gold statue, the Architect of Hogwarts, located in the Entrance Hall. His name lost to time, he planned and devised these castle walls that we call home with Rowena Ravenclaw. Modeling may also seem familiar to you, and that’s because it’s the process of hand building a form out of plastic materials such as clay, papier-mache, plaster, and wax. It’s similar to the hand building that we learned about in our lesson on pottery, as you are still building and shaping the overall form with your hands. However, unlike hand building in pottery, you are pressing your hands into the clay to create facial features and fine details rather than taking coils and shaping them into a pot. 

Assembly is similar to modeling in the sense that you are building the form, but instead of using one material, you are combining various materials. The final result of the sculpture (also known as an assemblage) depends equally on the materials used as well as the artist’s skill and vision. Assembly was initially inspired by collages, which were popular during Cubism, and took off during Dadaism. Now, this is different from found art or a readymade, which is art that is made from everyday objects but presented in a completely different context than you would normally find them in. You may remember Cathel Johnston, the Dada artist whom we mentioned in Year Six that stole magical items and placed them in a non-functional context. His art is actually considered found art. Other artists, such as Pablo Picasso and Marcel Duchamp, pioneered this genre of art, the latter especially, due to creating a famous and, at the time, outrageous piece called Fountain (c. 1917). It was a urinal with the signature “R. Mutt” that Duchamp submitted under a pseudonym for an exhibition of the Society of Independent Artists. This piece challenged the very notion of what we consider to be art; and unfortunately, despite Duchamp being on the board himself and paying the entry fee, Fountain was hidden from view during the show. The fallout from this decision was intense. Among other things, it led to Duchamp stepping down from the board, fellow Dada artists protesting in solidarity, and found art attaining new popularity amongst artists.

More importantly, it led to the creation of assemblages made through combining multiple pieces of found art. One of the earliest of these artists that delved into this style is Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven, a German witch who immigrated to the United States. She was quite a scandalous figure for her time in both mundane and wizarding social circles due to her radical androgynous appearance. The baroness was known to have created clothes adorned with kitchen utensils, tin cans, curtain rings, and street debris, to name just a few of her favorite materials. This was not only her way of using her body to create a living sculpture, but was also a form of activism, using performance art to show her views on anti-consumerism and anti-aestheticism. As far as assemblages go, her pieces were heavily inspired by found art. Duchamp was a notable inspiration for the baroness as evidenced by the Portrait of Marcel Duchamp (c. 1920-1922), though the creation of this piece may also be due to their close friendship. Interestingly enough, art historians also speculate that the baroness may have had a hand in the creation of Fountain due to Duchamp’s letter to his sister Suzanne reading, “One of my female friends under a masculine pseudonym, Richard Mutt, sent in a porcelain urinal as a sculpture.”

 

Left: Baroness Elsa von Freytag-Loringhoven - Right: Portrait of Marcel Duchamp

All of the techniques we have mentioned so far are known as additive processes, meaning that material is being added to create a form. Carving, the method of cutting away from a solid material to reach a desired form, is the only technique for traditional sculpture that is a subtractive process, since the artist is removing something to reveal the sculpture. Obviously, this method is very time consuming and can be extremely unforgiving - if you accidentally cut off a part you didn’t want to cut off, it can’t be put back. You will find that most early statues were carved out of stone, wood, clay, or ivory.

A large portion of sculptures in the wizarding world are created by the method of carving. Local stone sculptures include Magic is Might, which we discussed last year, and our friendly neighborhood gargoyles. Most magical wood sculptures tend to be made from the same magical trees as wands, with the intent of using a material that is more receptive to various spells and charms. Ivory sculptures, on the other hand, were actually made with wooly mammoth tusks until the mammoths died out. Instead of switching to elephants, which are more closely related to mammoths, magical artists looked towards the tusks of Tebos and the horns of Graphorns.

The tusks of Tebos were sought after to make small statuettes for a genre of magical sculpture known as Phasism during the early to mid-1900’s. This type of art used the Tebos’ natural trait of invisibility to create sculptures that would appear and disappear either at random or through an activation of some sorts. Sometimes a set of sculptures would even be charmed to disappear and reappear in a sequence. Needless to say, obtaining the tusks was not only difficult, since Tebos can turn invisible, but also extremely dangerous, as they can be quite aggressive. They are, after all, sporting a XXXX classification. The trend of Phasism sculptures died out in the late 1950’s when the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures put forward protections for Tebos due to a rapid rise in poaching. They were not only hunted for their tusks but for their hides as well, which were made into armor, shields, herbologist gloves, and invisibility cloaks. Graphorns were also sought after by artists due to their golden horns. The idea of creating gold sculptures with the texture of ivory was appealing to magical artists who weren’t keen on working with a material as soft as gold. This trend started during the 1800’s and lasted until Graphorns were brought to near extinction in the 1920’s, with Newt Scamander owning the last breeding pair on the planet. At the point of their near-extinction and given no other choice, some healers acquired these sculptures and ground them to be used for potions such as the Antidote to Uncommon Poisons. I suppose in dire times, art can be a literal life saver.

On that note, that’s all I have for today! This week you have a Project Hour assignment on either last week’s topic of pottery or today’s topic of sculpture. You have the power to pick! Also instead of a quiz this week, there is an extra credit essay assignment on found art. Make sure that your assignments are turned in on time, and I will see you next week!

Lesson written by Professor Serafina Rosenquist
Additional portions by Professor Aerianna Aolen and Professor Rose Honeysett