Michelangelo the Con Artist,The Renaissance was a revival of classical learning and art in Europe, a
Michelangelo the Con Artist,The Renaissance was a revival of classical learning and art in Europe, and as part of that revival there was a popular fad in collecting ancient Greek and Roman artifacts by wealthy 15th century hipsters. Before Michelangelo became the famous artist that we know today, he was a nobody starving artist just trying to pay the bills. Young Michelangelo attempted to cash in on this fad by forging copies of ancient statues and selling them as the real thing. One trick he did to make them look like they were ancient was to coat them in a very acidic type of mud, which would rapidly age the fraudulent statuary. Yes, before Michelangelo was a famous Renaissance artist, he was a devious 15th century con artist. In 1496 Michelangelo crafted a sleeping Cupid sculpture which he sold to an antiquities dealer named Baldaserre de Milanese, who in turn sold it to Cardinal Riario of San Giorgio. Cardinal Riario discovered the sculpture was a fake and demanded a refund from de Milanese, but praised Michelangelo for his incredible skill and talent. Cardinal Riario hired Michelangelo to craft original artwork for his collection, becoming Michelangelo’s first legitimate patron. The rest is art history. Note: The sleeping Cupid above is not by Michelangelo. The original work was destroyed in the Whitehall Palace fire of 1698. -- source link
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