Walking leopard

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Cameos displaying animals, a mainstay of ancient Roman glyptics revived by Neoclassical engravers, filled the cabinets of European royalty. Particularly fetching is the way the carver of the leopard capitalized on brownish flecks in the stone to give the beast its spots. The grinning recumbent lion shows a fine contrast of matte and polished surfaces. The carver of the walking lion nearly exhausted the stone’s red layer when forming the tail.

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art