What technique used for the Statue of Zeus at Olympia involves gold and ivory?

The technique used for the Statue of Zeus at Olympia involving gold and ivory is chryselephantine sculpture. The term describes a composite construction in which ivory represented flesh while gold covered clothing, hair and other details.

The statue was created by the Greek sculptor Phidias for the Temple of Zeus at Olympia, probably around 435 BC. It stood approximately 12 to 13 metres high on a wooden framework. Zeus sat on a richly decorated cedarwood throne, holding a small figure of Nike in one hand and a sceptre in the other.

Chryselephantine statues were prestigious because they combined specialist woodworking, ivory carving, metalwork and precious materials. The technique is not the same as sphyrelaton, which involved hammered metal sheets over a core. “Acrolith” refers to a statue with stone extremities attached to a different core, while “gleaming” is simply descriptive rather than the name of a sculptural technique.

The original Zeus statue no longer survives, so its appearance is reconstructed from ancient descriptions, coins and archaeological evidence.