Bust (sculpture)

A bust is a sculpted or cast representation of the upper part of the human body, depicting a person's head and neck, and a variable portion of the chest and shoulders.

As a format that allows the most distinctive characteristics of an individual to be depicted with much less work, and therefore expense, and occupying far less space than a full-length statue, the bust has been since ancient times a popular style of life-size portrait sculpture.

However, these are often fragments from full-body statues, or were created to be inserted into an existing body, a common Roman practice;[1] these portrait heads are not included in this article.

When another family member died, these were worn by people chosen for the appropriate build in procession at the funeral, in front of the propped-up body of the deceased, as an "astonished" Polybius reported, from his long stay in Rome beginning in 167 BC.

His Bust of King Charles I of England (1638) is now lost; artist and subject never met, and Bernini worked from the triple portrait painted by Van Dyck, which was sent to Rome.