The text discusses how muscles function in various actions, emphasizing the importance of considering individual characteristics like age and gender. It explains that young people generally have less developed muscles and how this influences artistic representations to appear refined. Additionally, it contrasts the muscle definition in overweight and moderately thin individuals, noting that thinner people often have better muscle definition and agility.
Maxims and Function of Muscles
This section introduces actions and functions, where we will indicate which muscles, by name and location, specifically act or stand still in various situations.
When considering the muscles of figures, one must always take into account the characteristics of individuals, particularly in terms of gender, age, and stature. This helps in appropriately applying each type of figure according to the natural harmony and beauty.
Therefore, it is essential to understand that young people are generally not strongly or prominently muscled. While the muscles indicate the strength of a perfectly robust and structured fleshly person, young individuals have yet to develop the maturity or firmness of muscles. This understanding ensures that such depictions will appear refined and noble, with an elegant and graceful build.
For overweight individuals, strongly elevated muscles are rarely seen, as their muscles typically appear weak and uncertain. The reason seems to be that these individuals have a lot of loose and soft fat between the skin and the muscles, making the skin necessarily smooth over them. Due to this, muscularly defined stout individuals are not favored: just as fat can overwhelm the muscles and restrict their movement; therefore, moderately thin people tend to be well-muscled, provided they live healthily, and they also tend to be quicker and more agile in their actions than those who are stout and sluggish.