A bozzetto is a small, rapidly modeled terracotta sketch used by sculptors to develop ideas in three dimensions. Learn how Bernini, Algardi, and Baroque sculptors used clay bozzetti.
When you stand in front of Bernini's Apollo and Daphne in the Galleria Borghese, you see marble so precisely carved that the bark growing over Daphne's fingers looks real. What you do not see is the small clay model that Bernini shaped with his own hands before a single chisel touched the marble. Bernini made dozens of these models for every major commission. He squeezed and pressed the clay, leaving fingerprints visible in the surface, working out the twist of a torso, the fall of drapery, the angle of a head. These models are called bozzetti, and they are the closest we can get to watching a great sculptor think.
A bozzetto (plural: bozzetti) is a small, rapidly executed sculptural sketch, typically modeled in clay or terracotta, used by sculptors to develop and test ideas before committing to the final work in marble, bronze, or stucco. The word comes from the Italian "bozzare," meaning to sketch or to rough out, derived from "bozzo," a rough stone or lump. Bozzetti are the three-dimensional equivalent of a painter's preparatory sketch. They are not finished models meant for display. They are working tools, made quickly, often in a single sitting, to explore composition, pose, and proportion in physical form.
This entry covers what bozzetti are, how Bernini and other Baroque sculptors used them, how they differ from more finished preparatory models, and where you can see them today.
Sculpture is a medium where mistakes are expensive. In marble, a wrong cut cannot be undone. In bronze, the casting process is costly and time-consuming. A bozzetto lets the sculptor experiment freely in a cheap, forgiving material. Clay can be added, removed, squashed, and reworked indefinitely. The sculptor can try multiple versions of a pose, test how a figure looks from different angles, and work out the relationship between multiple figures in a group, all before committing to the final material.
The Swedish architect Nicodemus Tessin the Younger visited Bernini's studio in 1668 and recorded the sculptor's working methods. According to Tessin, Bernini described his process as beginning with drawings, then moving to clay models. The caareviews analysis of Bernini's clay modeling notes that Bernini used "roughly finished bozzetti, larger and more highly finished modelli, and large-scale modelli grandi" at different stages of the design process. The bozzetto was the first three-dimensional stage: quick, rough, and exploratory. The modello was a more refined version, sometimes presented to the patron for approval. The modello grande was a full-scale or near-full-scale model used to guide the final carving.
The distinction between a bozzetto and a maquette is subtle but real. A bozzetto is a rough sketch, made for the sculptor's own use, not intended to be seen by anyone else. A maquette is a more finished presentation model, often shown to patrons or used to guide assistants. The terms overlap in practice, and some scholars use them interchangeably, but the bozzetto implies speed and roughness while the maquette implies a more deliberate, finished quality.
Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1598-1680) is the sculptor most closely associated with bozzetti, and his surviving clay models are the most studied examples of the form. The Metropolitan Museum's publication Bernini: Sculpting in Clay documents 52 terracotta models attributed to Bernini and his workshop, the largest group ever assembled for study. The 2012-2013 exhibition of the same name, held at the Metropolitan Museum and the Kimbell Art Museum, brought together the majority of Bernini's surviving bozzetti for the first time.
Bernini's bozzetti are remarkable for their speed and expressiveness. The clay surfaces show the marks of his fingers and tools, and the modeling has a looseness that contrasts sharply with the polished precision of his finished marbles. A bozzetto for the Angel with the Title of the Cross (1667-1668), now at the Museo di Palazzo Venezia in Rome, stands only 30 centimeters tall but conveys the same dramatic twist and forward momentum as the finished marble. The Italian cultural heritage catalog entry for this bozzetto documents six known versions, with scholars debating the sequence in which Bernini made them.
The Fogg Art Museum at Harvard holds 27 terracotta bozzetti associated with Bernini, the largest collection in any single museum. These were purchased in 1937 and have been the subject of extensive technical analysis. Conservators at the Harvard Art Museums used X-radiography and close surface examination to identify Bernini's personal modeling techniques, including distinctive tool marks and fingerprint patterns. The Objects Specialty Group postprints on Bernini's clay techniques describe how these technical signatures allow scholars to distinguish autograph Bernini bozzetti from workshop copies.
Algardi, Bernini's rival in Rome, also made terracotta bozzetti. His models for the tomb of Pope Leo XI and the Meeting of Attila and Pope Leo show a different sensibility from Bernini's. Algardi's bozzetti tend to be more restrained and classical, with less dramatic movement, but they served the same function: working out the composition in three dimensions before carving in marble.
Raggi was one of Bernini's most talented assistants, and his bozzetti are sometimes difficult to distinguish from Bernini's own. The 2012 Bernini exhibition included models attributed to Raggi, Ercole Ferrata, and Giuseppe Mazzuoli alongside Bernini's autograph works, showing how the practice of clay modeling pervaded the Roman Baroque workshop system.
The French Baroque sculptor Girardon made bozzetti for his commissions at Versailles. His terracotta models for the garden sculptures show the influence of Bernini's working methods, transmitted through Girardon's studies in Rome.
While Michelangelo is not known for surviving bozzetti in the Bernini sense, his working process included small wax and clay studies. Vasari describes Michelangelo modeling figures in wax before carving, and some small terracotta studies attributed to Michelangelo's circle survive in the Casa Buonarroti in Florence. The practice of making preparatory models in clay predates Bernini by at least a century, but it was Bernini who elevated the bozzetto to an art form in its own right.
In Bernini's workshop, bozzetti served multiple functions. First, they were thinking tools. Bernini modeled rapidly, often producing several versions of a figure to test different poses and compositions. The surviving bozzetti for the Ponte Sant'Angelo angels show at least six versions of a single figure, each with subtle variations in the angle of the body, the position of the legs, and the treatment of drapery.
Second, bozzetti were communication tools. Once Bernini settled on a design, a more finished modello was made and shown to the patron for approval. The modello for the Fountain of the Moor in the Piazza Navona, now in the Kimbell Art Museum, is Bernini's largest surviving modello and was presumably presented to the patron. It is more highly finished than a bozzetto but still shows the rapid, expressive modeling that characterizes Bernini's clay work.
Third, bozzetti and modelli were guides for assistants. Bernini's workshop was large and busy, and assistants did much of the rough carving on his commissions. The clay models gave assistants a three-dimensional reference for the composition, proportions, and pose that Bernini wanted. The master would then finish the critical areas, particularly the faces and hands, himself. This division of labor was standard in Baroque sculpture workshops, and the bozzetti were the mechanism that made it possible.
Terracotta bozzetti are fragile. They are unfired or lightly fired clay, and they can crumble, crack, or dissolve in water. Many bozzetti were discarded after the final work was completed, because they were considered working tools rather than finished art. The survival of Bernini's bozzetti is partly accidental: his heirs preserved some, and collectors recognized their value early enough to save them.
In the 18th century, bozzetti began to be collected as artworks in their own right. The Fogg Museum's collection of 27 Bernini bozzetti was assembled by a private collector in the early 20th century before being purchased by the museum. The Institute for Advanced Study publication on Bernini bozzetti by Irving Lavin documents the history of collecting and scholarship around these models, including the discovery of previously unknown bozzetti in French provincial museums.
Today, bozzetti are valued for what they reveal about the sculptor's creative process. They show the hand of the artist more directly than any finished marble or bronze. The fingerprints in the clay, the tool marks, the areas where the sculptor pressed and pulled and scraped, are all visible. A finished Bernini marble is polished and perfect. A Bernini bozzetto is alive.
The largest collection of Bernini bozzetti is at the Harvard Art Museums (Fogg Museum) in Cambridge, Massachusetts. The Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth holds several important Bernini modelli, including the Fountain of the Moor modello. In Rome, the Museo di Palazzo Venezia holds the bozzetto for the Angel with the Title of the Cross, and the Borghese Gallery displays the finished marbles that these bozzetti produced. Seeing the bozzetti and the finished marbles side by side is the best way to understand the relationship between the sketch and the final work.
For more on the sculptural process, read our entries on maquette, modeling, and sculpture. For the broader context of Baroque art, read our post on Baroque art and the Catholic Church, or explore our guide to reading a painting for more techniques you can spot in museums.
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