Before he was a titan of Renaissance art history, Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564) was a 12-year-old, although his childhood looked quite a bit different from what we associate with that age today. Already deeply invested in drawing and painting, he studied others’ work, such as an engraving titled “Saint Anthony Tormented by Demons,” created by 15th-century German artist Martin Schongauer. Unlike most tweens, though, when he set out to recreate the scene in tempera paint on a wood panel, he worked with a particular style that strongly hinted at the young boy’s preternatural talent.
This is the very first known painting by Michelangelo, titled “The Torment of Saint Anthony,” which was completed around 1487-88 at the age of 12 or 13. It wasn’t attributed to him until after the painting sold at auction in 2008 and a conservationist at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York removed yellowed varnish and some unskillful overpaint to reveal a unique color palette and attention to depth.
Art historians such as Everett Fahy, a longtime curator at The Met, asserted that the painting had been made by Michelangelo, even though when the work went to auction, it was attributed more generally to the large Florentine workshop of Domenico Ghirlandaio, with which Michelangelo joined as an apprentice in 1488.
Fahy’s convictions were bolstered by the unique composition that emerged after its restoration at the hands of conservator Michael Gallagher, backed by art historian and restorer Giorgio Bonsanti’s expert opinion that it was indeed made by Michelangelo.
With no one else able (at least yet) to provide credible enough evidence that it was not, the work was acquired by the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth, making it the only painting by the Renaissance master in a public collection in North America.
“The rare subject is found in the life of Saint Anthony the Great, written by Athanasius of Alexandria in the 4th century, which describes how the Egyptian hermit-saint had a vision that he levitated into the air and was attacked by demons, whose torments he withstood,” says the Kimbell, adding that historians like Ascanio Condivi and Giorgio Vasari—Michelangelo’s contemporaries—recounted that “to give the demonic creatures veracity, he studied the colorful scales and other parts of specimens from the fish market.”
It’s possible that the famously exacting Michelangelo wouldn’t have chosen to have his name associated with this “amateur” work, which may help explain its attribution to the workshop instead. But for art historians and enthusiasts alike, it’s a wonderful insight into some of the artist’s earliest creative explorations.
Below, enjoy a video from art historian Erick Giraldo, who runs a channel called Inspiraggio on YouTube.
