The sculptural flowering of the Italian Baroque - the sensuous beauty of Bernini's Apollo and Daphne; the spectacular papal tombs in St Peter's; dramatic altarpieces such as the mystical Ecstasy of St Teresa; and Rome's dazzling fountains - boldly transcended the traditional limitations of artistic media.

Often dismissed in the past for creating a sham world to distract the observer's attention with dazzling technical displays, the sculpture of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Italy is here reassessed for the first time in more than a generation. It is an invaluable critical survey of Italian Baroque sculpture.