Concept in Definition ABC

The term relief is of common app in two concrete and very dissimilar contexts such as the artistic on the one hand and on the other the geographical.

Because when in the world of art someone refers to or uses the term relief, is referring to the technique sculptural in which the modeled or carved forms of an artistic piece will stand out from its flat surroundings. The reliefs are generally integrated into a wall or, in the case of movable art, to the support that frames them.

Reliefs are very commonly applied in constructions, especially as part of the exterior decoration in monumental buildings such as temples. For example, the Corinthian frieze is decorated with bas-reliefs, while Parthenon, on the other hand, observes high-reliefs on its pediments.

Although this is not the only application of them, since the reliefs can be used to represent a scene isolated or a part of a narrative sequence, depending on the objective. Thanks to the reliefs it is possible to show and reflect details such as the musculature of a body.

Although we have just referred to two of the types of relief that exist, such as the high and the bas-reliefs, there are a few more... The sunken relief, the mediorrelief and the half bulge and bulge round.

And in the second meaning of the term relief that we had said has an application in a geographical context, relief refers to the forms that the Earth crust on the surface.

According to morphology and the altimetry they present we can find plains, which are extensions of flat or slightly broken terrain. Then the eminences that are relatively high ground with respect to their lower surroundings and the depressions of which a priori by its name it is clear that they are extensions of land of much lower level than the surroundings that surround them.

Although in the past little developed and quite elementary techniques were used to account for some relief in maps, today, and thanks to the use of contour lines that are lines that connect points that are at the same latitude, these obviously provide a picture much more precise and complete of the relief in question, but clearly to interpret them it will be necessary to know the equidistance that exists between them.