Bas-Relief

Definition

art : sculptural relief in which the

projection from the surrounding surface
is slight and no part of the modeled
form is undercut; also : sculpture
executed in bas-relief
Did You Know?

The best way to understand the meaning

of bas-relief is to see one—and the easiest
way to do that is to look at a penny, nickel,
or other coin and examine the raised images
on it; they're all bas-reliefs. English speakers
adopted bas-relief from French
(where bas means "low" and relief means
"raised work") during the mid-1600s; earlier,
we borrowed the synonymous basso-
relievo from Italian. The French and Italian
terms have common ancestors (and, in fact,
the French word is likely a translation of the
Italian), but English speakers apparently
borrowed the two independently. Bas-
relief is more prevalent in English today,
although the Italian-derived term has not
disappeared completely from the language.

窗体顶端

Examples

"Three [works] that caught my eye were

Maksymowicz's solemn plaster bas-
relief of bones and tools, Gina Michaels'
bronze sculpture of a prickly pear
cactus with pads in the shapes of
human feet, and Burnell Yow's totemic
found-object sculpture topped with an
animal skull." — Edith Newhall,  The
Philadelphia Inquirer , 18 July 2019
"Lorraine Hansberry's 60-year-old
American classic about a black family
in Chicago's South Side in the 1950s
that has a shot at the American dream
is given a volatile production that, like
a bas-relief , brings out details and
layers that have not been so clearly
defined in more traditional
approaches." — The Berkshire Eagle  
(Pittsfield, Massachusetts), 5 July 2019