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Classicism began its spread around the world through the Greek colonies scattered all around the [[Mediterranean Sea|Mediterranean]] and the [[Black Sea]]. [[Alexander the Great]] took it further, reaching [[India]]. In these regions, the principles of Greek sculpture were presented to the local populations and, blending with their traditions, gave rise to stylistic interpretations that more or less successfully reproduced the metropolitan aesthetic. This eclectic and cosmopolitan synthesis was called [[Hellenistic period|Hellenism]].<ref>TSETSKHLADZE, Gocha R. [http://books.google.es/books?hl=pt-BR&lr=&id=ctsUcNshh68C&oi=fnd&pg=PA361&dq=Xanthos++%22Nereid+Monument+%22&ots=fixzZnx9FO&sig=9Uv3T-9AR48ESeGn0d5Z-DkUe0s#PPR7,M1 "Introduction"]. In TSETSKHLADZE, Gocha R. (ed). ''Ancient Greeks West and East''. BRILL, 1999. pp. vii-ss</ref> [[Ancient Rome]], in turn, was another avid recipient of classical Greek culture. Its sculptors took pride in working under Greek inspiration, and by multiplying copies of Greek originals that were later lost, they were the transmitters to posterity of a significant part of the culture they imitated.<ref>JENKYNS, Richard. [http://books.google.es/books?hl=pt-BR&lr=&id=Njtr3o9_v7MC&oi=fnd&pg=PA1&dq=%22roman+statuary%22&ots=BlmO0xDcOb&sig=68k47f5nzKjTyHVpEvtfh0--KeQ#PPA295,M1 "The Legacy of Rome"]. In JENKYNS, Richard (ed.). ''The Legacy of Rome''. Oxford University Press, 1992. pp. 1-5</ref> From the legacy transmitted by the Romans, early [[Christianity]] drew the models for starting its own art, but after the sixth century its policy changed. Until this time immense amounts of sculpture still survived in temples and ancient monuments, but from then on their ubiquitous nudity began to be felt as an offense to Christian morality, as well as being condemned as diabolical [[Cult image|cult images]] and bad reminders of [[paganism]]. Losing their former value, ancient works began to be destroyed en masse. On the other hand, during the [[Renaissance]], classical culture fell back into the elites' favor and was the fulcrum of a recovery of the dignity of the body and of purely aesthetic pleasure. Christianity itself, after proscribing for centuries the pagan sculptural heritage, recovered it, transforming and adapting it to serve it and praise the heroes of the new order: the saints and martyrs of the faith. The Renaissance conception of art largely reproduces the idea formulated by the classical philosophers.<ref name=":8" /><ref name=":7" /> The prestige that classical statuary knew in this period reached the borders of passion, as can be seen in this excerpt by [[Giovanni Pietro Bellori]]:
[[File:Belvedere_Apollo_Pio-Clementino_Inv1015.jpg|left|thumb|[[Leochares]]: Apolo Belvedere, Roman copy. [[Vatican Museums]]]]
<blockquote>Painters and sculptors, choosing from among the most elegant beauties of the natural world, perfect the Idea, and their works surpass and stand above Nature - which is the ultimate scope of these arts. [...] This is the origin of the veneration and awe we have for statues and paintings, and from this derives the reward and honor of Artists; this was the glory of Timantes, Apeles, Phydias and Lysippus, and of so many others renowned for their fame, all who, rising above human forms, achieved with their Ideas and works an admirable perfection. This Idea may then be called the perfection of Nature, the miracle of art, the clairvoyance of the intellect, the example of the mind, the light of imagination, the rising sun, which from the east inspires the statue of Menon, and inflames the monument of Prometheus.<ref>ENGASS & BROWN, p. 15</ref></blockquote>For the [[Romanticism|Romantics]], especially in [[Germany]], Greece continued to be seen as a model of life and culture. Nietzsche exclaimed, "Oh, the Greeks! They knew how to live!". Other scholars, in the same vein, despising the Roman filter, began to cultivate the ideals of Greek Classicism to such an extent that a veritable Grecomania was created, influencing all humanities and artistic forms.<ref>BEHLER, Ernst. [http://books.google.es/books?id=JIdcStQg4g0C&printsec=copyright&dq=classical+greek+sculpture++%22legacy+%22&lr=&hl=pt-BR#PPA118,M1 "The Force of Classical Greece in the Formation of Romantic Age in Germany"]. In THOMAS, Carol G. (ed). ''Paths from Ancient Greece''. Brill, 1988, p. 118- ss</ref><ref name=":9">Squire, Michael. "The Legacy of Greek Sculpture". In: Palagia, Olga (ed.). ''Handbook of Greek Sculpture''. Walter de Gruyter, 2019, pp. 657-689</ref> In [[Neoclassicism]], classical [[humanism]] was a significant impulse for the consolidation of [[
In the early twentieth century, academic studies multiplied and were refined to unprecedented levels with the development of new methods of archaeological research and the improvement of the theoretical and instrumental apparatus.<ref>WEISBERG, Ruth. [http://books.google.es/books?hl=pt-BR&lr=&id=mXPl4yUMlVkC&oi=fnd&pg=PR9&dq=sculpture+classical+heritage+OR+legacy+%22greek+art%22&ots=iHlj1jOmSF&sig=yV7Giqz1aTXEb3ZxM5rt81lxNzo#PPA25,M1 "Twentieth-Century Rhetoric: Enforcing Originality and Distancing the Past"]. In GAZDA, Elaine K. (ed). ''The ancient art of emulation''. University of Michigan Press, 2002. p. 26</ref> At the same time, in a way officializing the intense love for the classics that since the 18th century had been cultivated by German intellectuals, Classicism was co-opted by the [[Nazism|Nazis]], who saw in its formal models the glorified image of the [[Aryan race]] and, in its values the basis for the formation of a pure society, a healthy race and a strong state, establishing it as a reference standard for state-sponsored art and using it to justify the eradication of races and cultures deemed "degenerate", such as the Jews and [[Modern art|modernist art]].<ref>Sauquet, Mathilde. [https://digitalrepository.trincoll.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=https://www.google.com/&httpsredir=1&article=1050&context=fypapers "Propaganda Art in Nazi Germany: The Revival of Classicism"]. In: ''The First-Year Papers (2010 - present)''. Trinity College Digital Repository, Hartford, 2014</ref><ref>Redner, ↵Harry. "Dialectics of Classicism: The birth of Nazism from the spirit of Classicism". In: ''Thesis Eleven'', 2019; 152 (1):19-37</ref> [[Benito Mussolini|Mussolini]] tried to propose a similar model for [[Fascist Italy (1922–1943)|Fascist Italy,]] but it did not have much practical impact.<ref name=":9" />
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