The Problem of Form in Painting and Sculpture

In this work, first published in 1893, the sculptor Adolf von Hildebrand, adhering to the classical understanding, openly opposes the Romanticism of 19th-century Germany. Hildebrand argues that the sculptor's aim is to allow form to emerge by freeing itself from the stone mass; in this respect, he is a student of Michelangelo, and truth reveals itself as form. In this approach, the subject matter is of secondary importance, and Hildebrand's ideas influenced the formalist aesthetics of 20th-century Modernism. The artist's activity consists of developing his faculties, especially those of sight and touch, in such a way as to provide him with a perception of space. For modern man, sculpture means a figure condemned to be erected in the middle of a public square, around which one can walk.