Relief in sculpture refers to the raising or sinking of the modeled form from the flat background plane. Reliefs are found all over the world, especially on the walls of monumental buildings. Bas-relief is French for "low relief", derived from the Italian "basso rilievo". In this, the overall depth of a projecting image is shallow. The background is very compressed or completely flat, as on coins, and all images are in low-relief.
Bas-relief is used to depict scenes with many figures and other elements such as landscape or architectural features. A bas-relief may use any medium or technique of sculpture, but stone carving and metal casting are the traditional ones.
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