Sculpture



Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sculptural processes originally used carving (the removal of material) and modeling (the addition of material, as clay), in stone, metal, ceramics, wood and other materials but, as a society reaches its industrial civilization phase, shifts in sculptural process lead to an almost complete freedom of materials and process. A wide variety of materials may be worked by removal such as carving, assembled by welding or modeling, or molded, or cast.

Sculpture in stone survives far better than works of art in perishable materials, and often represents the majority of the surviving works (other than pottery) from ancient cultures, though conversely traditions of sculpture in wood may have vanished almost entirely. However, most ancient sculpture was brightly painted, and this has been lost. Those cultures whose sculptures have survived in quantities include the cultures of Terra, Sares, Pan Saran and Ult.