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© History Oasis / Created via Midjourney
I’ve compiled some of the most famous sculptures of all time, from the Olmec Heads to the Statue of Liberty. These masterpieces still inspire budding artists today.
Discovered in the Mexican jungle in 1862, the Olmec Heads—some weighing 40 tons—predate Mayans and Aztecs. They were created by the first major Mesopotamian civilization, the Olmecs. These early peoples transported the heads from mountain quarries to lowland sites without wheels or beasts of burden. It remains a mystery why they were constructed.
At 24, Michelangelo carved the Pietà from a single block of Carrara marble as a meditation on grief. It’s also the only work he ever signed—after overhearing visitors attribute it to another sculptor.
Initially conceived as Dante contemplating his Divine Comedy for Rodin’s Gates of Hell project, the brooding bronze Thinker sculpture became an icon for philosophy. The muscular figure with furrowed brow suggests thought as physical labor, the mind’s work manifested in tensed limbs.
Venus de Milo was unearthed by a Greek farmer in 1820. The marble sculpture triggered a diplomatic incident before arriving in Paris as Napoleon’s consolation prize for lost Venetian treasures. Known for her missing arms—possibly broken during a tug-of-war between French sailors and local workers.
Brâncuși’s sleek bronze Bird in Space sculpture became the centerpiece of a 1926 legal battle. When U.S. customs officials classified it as a kitchen utensil, Judge Waite ruled that the sculpture was art and helped legitimize modernism in America.
Farmers digging a well during a 1974 drought near Xi’an stumbled upon 8,000 life-sized clay soldiers, each with unique facial features, guarding Emperor Qin Shi Huang’s tomb. The paranoid emperor built the Terracotta Army in a quest for immortality.
Danish-American sculptor Gutzon Borglum spent 14 years dynamiting a sacred Lakota mountain to create Mount Rushmore. Over 400 workers had to dangle from the air from harnesses to remove 450,000 tons of granite. After the sculptor’s death, Borglum’s son Lincoln completed the giant sculpture of the famous U.S. presidents.
As Brazil emerged from monarchy into a republic, Catholic leaders countered growing secularism with this Art Deco savior designed by French sculptor Paul Landowski. Workers had to haul up the 2,300-foot Corcovado Mountain by rail, assembling reinforced concrete and soapstone tiles that withstood the elements to become Brazil’s most iconic art piece.
French sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi built the Statue of Liberty before it was shipped to the USA as a centennial gift. The monument was engineered by Gustave Eiffel years before he created the Eiffel Tower. The sculpture, modeled after Bartholdi’s mother, was the first thing millions of immigrants saw before entering America.
Archaeologist Josef Szombathy unearthed the Venus of Willendorf near an Austrian village in 1908. The sculpture was originally painted thousands of years ago with red ochre, features exaggerated fertility attributes, and a faceless head, representing one of humanity’s earliest artistic impulses. It is one of the most famous sculptures created by people of the Ice Age.
Marcel Duchamp submitted a standard porcelain urinal—signed “R. Mutt”—to the Society of Independent Artists exhibition in 1917. Though the original was later lost after being photographed by Alfred Stieglitz, the sculpture birthed the conceptual art movement.
Soviet authorities commissioned sculptor Yevgeny Vuchetich to create a 279-foot concrete colossus commemorating the Battle of Stalingrad, where nearly two million perished. The sword-wielding figure continues her eternal call to defend the homeland to this day.
Cosimo de Medici commissioned a bronze sculpture of the prophet David for his palace courtyard. Donatello designed the sculpture as the first freestanding male nude since antiquity. The sculpture is known for its provocative stance—one foot casually resting on Goliath’s severed head.
The Great Sphinx of Giza, designed with a human head and lion’s body, was built to guard Egypt’s pyramids for 4,500 years. The carving was probably created during Pharaoh Khafre’s reign. However, the Great Sphinx has gone on to inspire archaeological controversies, and many question its weathering patterns, fueling debates about the origins of Egyptian civilization.
Alberto Giacometti’s emaciated Walking Man sculptures emerged from his obsessive postwar studio practice, where he repeatedly created and destroyed works in search of the essential human form. Though appearing fragile, these spindly bronzes have been sold for butt loads of money—in 2010, “Walking Man I” sold for $104.3 million.
Archaeologists excavating Delphi’s sacred precinct in 1896 uncovered a well-preserved bronze sculpture of a Charioteer. Created to commemorate a chariot racing victory by Sicilian tyrant Polyzalus, the life-sized figure with inlaid glass eyes survived by chance—buried in a landslide that protected him from looters until his rediscovery.
Cardinal Federico Cornaro commissioned the Ecstasy of Saint Teresa for his family chapel in Rome during the Counter-Reformation when Catholics were trying to regain ground from Protestantism. Bernini integrated architecture, sculpture, and hidden lighting to create a multimedia experience. The statue is known for appearing to float on marble clouds as an angel prepares to pierce her heart with a golden arrow.
Eighty-eight-year-old Louise Bourgeois transformed a lifetime of psychological exploration into the Mamam. The sculpture was designed as a 30-foot bronze spider with marble eggs in its abdomen. The artist created these arachnids as tributes to her mother, a weaver who restored tapestries in the family business.
When Bangkok became Thailand’s capital in 1782, King Rama I ordered the construction of a Buddha entering nirvana for a restored ancient temple. Measuring 150 feet and covered in gold leaf, the Reclining Buddha of Wat Pho is inlaid with 108 mother-of-pearl symbols representing Buddha’s auspicious characteristics.
French consul Charles Champoiseau excavated the Winged Victory of Samothrace sculpture in fragments on a Greek island in 1863, shipping it to Paris, where it was reassembled. Though her head and arms were never recovered, this masterpiece of the Hellenic era influenced generations of artists.
European explorers reaching Rapa Nui on Easter Sunday, 1722, encountered nearly 900 monolithic figures created by Polynesian colonizers who had arrived around 1200 CE. Recent archaeological evidence suggests catastrophic deforestation may have contributed to the civilization’s collapse—the same trees needed to move these 14-ton statues.
Vineyard owner Felice de Freddi’s 1506 Roman excavation unearthed the sculpture of Laocoön and His Sons. The discovery would transform Renaissance art, prompting Pope Julius II to dispatch experts, including Michelangelo. The marble statue shows a priest and his sons writhing in the coils of sea serpents—punishment for warning against the Trojan Horse.
Despite initial opposition—local newspapers dubbed it the “rusty flasher”—Antony Gormley’s 66-foot steel figure of the Angel of the North, created with a 177-foot wingspan in 1998, is now seen by 33 million people annually.
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