Scroll down for the complete archive! And don't forget about our Image Galleries which accompany most episodes.
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News Flash! Art historians claim to have identified two bronze statuettes as by the hand of Michelangelo! in this current events episode, Jason attempts to examine the hard evidence for this claim, but discovers there isn't any...
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Jean Antoine Houdon was the greatest portrait sculptor in European history. The fidelity to nature he maintained in his work was an inspiration for the Realists of the 19th century and each generation which came after - all the more amazing when we consider that Houdon was a product of the Rococo and the Old Regime!
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The idea of looking towards Greek art for inspiration wasn't exactly new in the late 18th Century with artists such as Canova and David. Artists had been doing it constantly, and for centuries. And yet, the name we give the dominant style of that period - Neoclassicism - seems to imply there was. What was so 'Neo' about Neoclassicism? Listen to the podcast and join the Enlightened.
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Exactly how and when did the focus of European art move from Florence and Rome, to Paris? This episode explores the rise of the French academic system and the forerunners of the Ecole Des Beaux-Arts and the Paris Salon under the absolute monarchy of Louis XIV.
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Bernini Part Two! We discuss how Bernini sought to combine color, sculpture light and architecture into a single, unified, and total work of art. But Bernini went beyond even that, by creating what can be described as 'layered realities' within several of his works resulting in some of the richest and most complex sculptures ever created.
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Apollo and Daphne, Pluto and Persephone, The Ecstasy of Saint Teresa... Never has a single sculptor produced as many absolute masterpieces as Gianlorenzo Bernini. In this first of a two-part episode, Jason discusses Bernini's biography and his important early works which initiated the Baroque Era of sculpture.
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Following up on the Elgin Marbles debate, Jason explores the nature of public art, and whether or if a work of art can cease to be. How fragmented, altered, abused, displaced, and appropriated can a sculpture be before it is a relic, rather than a sculpture?
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News and Notes! Current events covered in this episode include the lastest chapter in the two-century old controversy surrounding the Elgin Marbles, a group of statuary taken from the Parthenon in Greece and brought to England. Also, information on TRAC, or The Representaional Art Conference, taking place in 2015.
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Whether it's at a university degree program or in a small private atelier, most figurative sculptors today train at schools, rather than as apprentices to professional sculptors. But what was the first art school in Europe? why was it created? Your host Jason Arkles details the history of the rise of the academy as a way to train artists in a more varied, eclectic, and intellectually challenging program than traditional apprenticeships allowed.
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Giambologna's remarkable and prolific career is the missing link between the Renaissance and the Baroque, between Michelangelo and Bernini, and between medieval and modern conceptions of how a sculptor's career is conducted. So many elements which Giambologna pioneered in his work - casting works in editions, jobbing out technical aspects of sculpture to specialists, and the decorative, small scale female nude for popular consumption - are still with us today.
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The sculptor of the famous Perseus and Medusa, Benvenuto Cellini, might have been a one-hit wonder if it were not for his other masterpiece, his Autobiography - the first from an artist. In his book, Cellini details the construction and casting of his Perseus - a precious firsthand account of a Renaissance sculptor at work - as well as his exploits as a nasty, brutish, jealous, pandering thug who murdered and raped his way through life. Your shameless host Jason Arkles brings the Autobiography to life in a dramatic reading, complete with cheap sound effects and silly voices.
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The Divine Michelangelo - The man could do no wrong. ...At least, according to Michelangelo. One of his lasting legacies, apart from his art, is the mythology about his life and work that he himself perpetuated through the commissioning of a biography. But legends aside, Michelangelo still is one of the gresatest artists ever to have lived. This episode discusses his early years as an artist, his training and his influences, his early successes and even his (gasp!) mistakes. he was only human, after all (despite rumors to the contrary).
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The history of canons of proportions and their use by sculptors is discussed in this week's episode. From the Egyptians up to the present day, artists have sought the key to caputring an ideal, or a norm, in human form. As it happens, notions of ideals - and of what we consider normal - change over time, which has given rise to dozens of canons practiced by different artists at different times. Host Jason Arkles discusses several, and how artists have always sought to tie the measurements of the human form to other notions of perfection- be it the sacred, or geometry - or even sacred geometry.
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If you sculpt, you probably have a small library of how-to sculpture manuals. Sculptors writing about sculpture goes way back - but how far back? In this episode, Host Jason Arkles discusses the sculpture manual that was written during the early renaissance by the original Renaissance Man, Leon Battista Alberti. A personal friend of Donatello, Brunelleschi, and Ghiberti, Alberti's treatise on the science and practice of sculpture during the early Renaissance show us just how much in common we have with the past masters- and how much we might be able to learn from them.
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The Clay Episode. Do you want to hear someone talk about clay for an entire hour? ...Oh, yes you do. It just might change the way you use clay. Jason discusses where clay comes from, how most of us use a clay made for other purposes than making sculptures, and how to formulate your own clay to best meet the needs of the clay modeler. Be sure to check out the image gallery for this episode for full instructions with pics and video on how to recycle your clay and make it better!
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Jason discusses the merits of his favorite Mutant Ninja Turtle. Did you know that Donatello also sculpted? we look at his life and works in regards to his influence over the course of European sculpture, making a case for Donatello being the single most influential sculptor in the last 700 years.
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The inaugural episode, in which your affable host explains the nature and purpose of the podcast, why he calls it 'The Sculptor's Funeral' in the first place, and then, discusses the seeming death of figurative sculpture in the 20th century and possible causes for such a catastrophe... but don't nail the coffin shut just yet.
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