Michelangelo
Bacchus
1497
Sculpted in Rome in 1496–1497 when Michelangelo was barely twenty-two, 'Bacchus' depicts the god of wine in a frank state of inebriation — grapes spilling from his lifted cup, his weight shifting off-balance, his gaze glassy — while a mischievous young satyr behind him steals grapes from the bunch in Bacchus's other hand. The sculpture revives ancient pagan sensuality with unprecedented frankness for a modern Christian artist, and its anatomical precision already foretells Michelangelo's 'David' two years later. Today it is one of the defining Renaissance sculptures of the Bargello in Florence.
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Image source: Wikimedia Commons