Right foot
The two feet, sculpted separately, are missing. Their position is indicated by the form of the marble surfaces on which they were mounted. The right foot—all that remains is the slightly raised heel—rested on the base.
Left foot
The two feet, sculpted separately, are missing. Their position is indicated by the form of the marble surfaces on which they were mounted. The left foot was still in the air: the Victory was not portrayed walking but alighting, with only her right foot touching the ground.
Chiton
The Victory is wearing a chiton, a tunic of thin cloth, belted beneath her breasts and falling in folds to her feet.
Note the masterful treatment of the garment’s flowing drapery, revealing rather than concealing her body: the fabric is rippling over her stomach and left thigh, bunched in deeper, flowing folds on her left hip and right side, and falling freely over the front of the left leg, where surface incisions convey the undulations of the thin fabric.
Himation
The cloak or himation, worn wrapped in a roll round the waist, has worked loose at the figure’s left hip. A large gathering of folds has slipped down between the legs, from where the fabric then falls to the ground in deep folds. At the rear, another, much shorter length of cloth is flapping in the wind behind the left thigh.
The treatment of the deep, thick folds of the himation or cloak contrasts strikingly with the drapery of the chiton or tunic it partly conceals.
The extremely sophisticated forms of the cloak’s folds become clear when the outside and inside of the garment are highlighted in different colors, following the folds of the cloth.
Left shoulder and breast
The upward movement of the right shoulder and breast, as well as the fold of material starting from the tip of the breast, accentuates the swaying movement of the torso, produced by the position of the arms—the right arm raised and the left arm probably lowered. Yet there is no torsion of the body: both shoulders and both hips are facing us on the same plane.
Belt
The tunic’s skirts are raised by a belt, hidden by the folds hanging over the hips. The loose fabric this creates above the waist is held in place by a second belt beneath the breasts.
Much of this area was recreated in plaster.
Shoulder strap?
The right breast is partly covered by almost transparent fabric, held in place by a thin shoulder strap, the remains of which are still visible on top of the right shoulder. There would have been another, less taut strap over the left shoulder.
Left wing
The full span of the left wing is more visible from a three-quarter angle.
The ruffled feathers near the body, the long flight feathers extending rearwards, and the position of the wing slightly above horizontal contribute to the sculpture’s overall dynamism.
Right wing
The statue’s right wing is entirely in plaster.
Fragments of the original wing indicate
that the right wing was not symmetrical to the left wing but raised higher and pointing slightly more to the rear.
The flapping drapery at the rear
The bottom of the cloak is flapping in the wind behind the left thigh. The sculptor’s aim in daringly creating this drapery projecting from the body itself was to render the effect of the wind even more tangible and spectacular. We are being shown a snapshot of a fleeting moment: only the wind is still holding the cloak to the body as it falls.