Pietà Rondanini of Michelangelo

Unfinished, fragile, moving, poetic, intense… This is how the Pietà Rondanini is often described, Michelangelo Buonarroti‘s last work, to which the artist dedicated over ten years of work (from 1552 to 1564) and to which he entrusted the grace of the emotions of the last part of his life.

The symbol of piety runs throughout Michelangelo’s life, from the Pietà in St. Peter’s, sculpted by a young Michelangelo in his early twenties and immediately recognized as a masterpiece of form, to the Pietà Bandini, left partially unfinished due to a break in the marble, up to the Pietà Rondanini, sculpted solely for personal purposes with its emotional and spiritual dimension.

Yes, because one of the first things that catches the eye when seeing the sculptural group is its vertical tension, the upward thrust given by the two standing figures who, however, by turning their gaze downward and by the slight curvature of their backs, balance the composition by showing the human fragility and tenderness of the mother supporting her child.

Michelangelo had already sketched the figure of Jesus when he decided to modify the sculpture’s layout by placing the bust of Christ in front of that of the Madonna, thus creating a special closeness between the two bodies. Even when viewed in profile, the visual effect is that of the mother’s figure, her curvature offering ultimate shelter and caring protection to her son.

The Pietà Rondanini, housed in the Sforzesco Castle in a dedicated and recently restored room, is striking for its incompleteness, for the figure of Christ that seems to emerge from the marble and simultaneously surrender to rest, for the embracing bodies that exude pain and tenderness, for the close-knit faces that seem to caress each other, for that imperfection that leaves room to imagination…

It’s already beautiful in photos, but seeing it in person is something else!