Hailed by his contemporaries as the new Phidias, the man who had restored sculpture to the sublime heights once thought to be reserved for classical statuary, Antonio Canova had the ambition and genius to establish himself on the international scene as a “living ancient sculptor,” indelibly shaping the taste of the era in which he lived and worked.

This volume retraces the stages of an imaginary journey in Canova’s footsteps. A journey through time and space that, from the creative universe of his atelier, traverses the principal courts of Europe, discovering the episodes and encounters with the figures that shaped the course of his life and European history.