The anatomy of the external forms of man : intended for the use of artists, painters and sculptors / By J. Fau ; edited with additions by Robert Knox. With an atlas of twenty-eight plates, quarto.

  • Fau, Julien.
Date:
1849
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The anatomy of the external forms of man : intended for the use of artists, painters and sculptors / By J. Fau ; edited with additions by Robert Knox. With an atlas of twenty-eight plates, quarto. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    A brief sketch of some of these enquiries I have added to M. Fau’s work. Authorized by the spirited publisher to spare no expense in rendering the work as useful as possible to artists, I have caused to be added by a distinguished lithographist, four additional plates. These plates refer to the Townley Venus, now in the British Museum; to the Elgin marbles; to the busts of the young and the aged Hercules; to that of the young Memnon, the noblest remains of all the Coptic monuments I have yet seen. These latter are also in the galleries of the Museum; and to them have been added a profile of the Apollo Belvidere. The reasons for my selecting these figures, will be found at length in the Appendix; a single word only is requisite here in reference to their connexion with the original descrip- tive work. The type sketched by M. Fau of the human form, has decidedly been taken from the antique statues, those admirable chef's-cToeuvres of the great masters; and this is true, whether the male or the female figure be considered. It may, in truth, be said, that had the author’s whole mind not been filled with the recollec- tion of these noble figures, derived from a deep study of their outlines, he never could have composed this work. But his lithographic figures, with the exception of the dissected Laocoon, give us only sketches of the living model, falling far short of his own description, and of the grand conceptions of the minds of those who have profitably studied the antique. This discrepancy between a large portion of the descriptive letter-press