Madonna and Child

Michelangelo carved this marble Madonna and Child between 1503 and 1505. The 128 cm sculpture shows Mary seated with the Christ child standing between her knees, almost stepping away from her. Unlike traditional depictions of a smiling mother cradling an infant, this Virgin gazes downward in quiet contemplation while her son appears ready to leave.

This was the only Michelangelo sculpture to leave Italy during his lifetime. Bruges cloth merchants Giovanni and Alessandro Moscheroni purchased it for 100 ducats. The sculpture has twice been removed: by Napoleon's forces in 1794 (returned after Waterloo) and by retreating German soldiers in 1944 (discovered in an Austrian salt mine). It stands in the Church of Our Lady in Bruges, a High Renaissance work in a Gothic setting.