NEOCLASSICISM. — In a broad sense it can mean any deliberate or programmatic return to expressive forms of classical taste; thus one may speak of neoclassical moments and tendencies in Hellenistic art, Roman art, Byzantine art, and so on. In a narrower sense, the term refers to the emergence and spread, in the visual arts, of a particular taste characteristic of the second half of the 18th century and the early years of the 19th, whereby in architecture, sculpture, painting, and every other form of artistic expression of a decorative nature, an interest, a study, and hence a deliberate imitation of the forms of ancient classical art is reflected, investigated with an archaeological mentality, spirit, and culture; and this chiefly in accordance with the theories of J. J. Winckelmann and other learned Italians and foreigners.
Neoclassicism is framed within the great Romantic movement (see ROMANTICISM) and is one of the aspects of that dissatisfaction with the manifestations of mentality and taste.