Curator’s inspection

Move across the painting — or drag on touch — to study brushwork and craquelure through the curator’s loupe.
Pietà
Mary holds her dead Son across her lap, serene and impossibly young, carved by a sculptor of twenty-four.
The only work Michelangelo ever signed — on the sash across Mary's breast.
Her youthfulness was defended by Michelangelo as a sign of her purity.
Damaged by a hammer attack in 1972; it has since stood behind glass.
Source: Wikimedia Commons. Public domain work; reproduction licence as listed at source.

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