Sans titre

Antonio Bonazza (Italy, 1698 - 1763)  Bozzetto for the Marble ’The Assumption of the Virgin’ in the Padua Duomo, circa 1740 Sculpture, Terracotta on painted wood base

Rococo primarily refers to architectural ornament from about 1700 to about 1760. In sculpture, forms became more delicate, silhouettes more irregular, and the treatment of all subjects (even gruesome ones) more charming, than they had been in the Baroque period.  The Italian word for this phenomenon, barochetto (the “little Baroque”), aptly expresses much – but not all – of the difference between the two styles.