The Young Archer Attributed to Michelangelo

Metropolitan Museum of Art

New York

The Metropolitan Museum recently put a new work by Michelangelo on semi­permanent display—or did it? asked Miranda Siegel in New York. Thirteen years ago, a few scholars advanced a controversial theory that this previously unheralded sculpture was actually an unrecognized early work by the Florentine master. Ever since, art historians have continued “to pick over its anatomy and history for clues” as to whether the attribution is accurate. Now we all can join in the game. Do we believe those who see similarities to known Michelangelo masterpieces in such details as the finely distinguished curls of the young archer’s hair or the athletic jut of the chin? Or are the skeptics right when they claim that “the boy’s legs don’t bear his weight quite right,” and that the odd pose and unfinished quality prove it must be the work of a lesser artist?

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It’s tempting to chalk up the work’s infelicities to a young artist’s learning his trade, said Christopher Knight in the Los Angeles Times. “If it is by Michelangelo,” this work would have been one of his very earliest in marble, created when he was still “a teenager living in the house of Lorenzo de’ Medici in Florence.” The unfinished quality could suggest that the dissatisfied artist abandoned it for some reason. Unfortunately, the fact that the work has been badly damaged over the years—and is missing many parts—makes it difficult to form conclusions. We don’t even know if the archer is supposed to represent a particular figure from history or mythology, such as Apollo or Cupid. Yet, perhaps precisely because so much about the work is a mystery, taking the time to quietly study it can prove a beguiling experience.