Shock value? That's kids' stuff. Back in Renaissance Venice, this was the ultimate challenge: create a beauty so ideal that onlookers would get emotionally involved, even fall in love.



One sculptor made that his mission.



At a time when ancient objects were being excavated in Rome, Tullio Lombardo (1455-1532) became infatuated by classical Greek and Roman culture. The son of an revered Venice architect who integrated sculpture into tombs, monuments and civic buildings, Tullio carried on the family tradition while forging his own style in super high relief. He melded the allure of antiquity with the emotional depth, luminosity and technical supremacy of his own Venetian Renaissance age.



And what a time it was. Titian, Bellini and Giorgione were painting masterpieces that would shine for centuries to come. Rivalries raged between painters and sculptures to prove which was the superior art.



Tullio embraced every chance to show off his chops, and that's evident in the National Gallery of Art's new exhibition, "An Antiquity of Imagination: Tullio Lombardo and Venetian High Renaissance Sculpture."



The high-def marble master's busts are sculpted portraits. Up close, the figures seem to erupt out of, rather than be carved from, stone. They appear thunderstruck by some tempestuous deity, frozen for eternity -- stories demanding to be told. Why does he look melancholy, she looks blissed out, and another in torment? What happened between the couple gazing outward instead of each other? Who are these people -- ancient gods, mythological characters or modern mortals?



"Tullio makes us want to know," says the exhibition's curator, Alison Luchs, noting his works "are sensuous and spiritual at the same time." Check the remarkable high undercut relief in marble. Cascades of curly hair, dainty teeth tucked behind lips poised to spill a sigh, cry or secret, some tinted pink. Eyelids hooding eyes made to glint, collarbones lifting supple flesh. Which is all, incredibly, carved from marble.



One Tullio trademark is the mixing of classical with modern. Here's a head-wreath of leaves and grapes, there's a hairdo fashionable in Tullio's day.



The micro-show features selections from emulators of Tullio's emo style. A piece sculpted by his younger brother Antonio portrays a nude man, his cape tossed to the wind, chest armor on the floor. The inscription reads: "I, Mars, cannot make war unless I remove my clothes."



When yearning to hear the stories about these people turned to stone, you realize Tullio nailed his goal.