Possibly Lady Georgiana Bingham c. 1816 - 1824

This is a marble bust, possibly of Lady Georgiana Bingham, made by Bertel Thorvaldsen. Marble, of course, is a material prized for its pure color and capacity to take a high polish. Here, the crisp carving really shows the qualities of the stone. Notice how the artist has taken full advantage of marble’s homogenous quality to create fine, almost porcelain-like details, like the curls of her hair. The whiteness of the marble also underscores a cultural value: Neoclassical sculptors like Thorvaldsen thought of ancient Greek and Roman sculpture as being purely white. Now, we know that they were actually painted, but that didn’t stop sculptors from using white marble to suggest an ideal of European beauty. Think about the labor involved in the extraction and refinement of marble. It is the convergence of industry, craft, and art that gives this bust its full meaning.