Is Laocoon A Michelangelo Fake?
It is one of the masterpieces of ancient Greek sculpture. But could the Laocon really be a fake by Michelangelo? Jonathan Jones reports. April 30, 2005 The Guardian It’s true that Michelangelo was a brilliant forger. And it’s true that he was obsessed with snakes, with serpentine twisting limbs, with emotional extremes and, most of all, with being bound. His two sculptures in the Louvre, his greatest outside Italy, have been known for ever as the Heroic Slave and the Dying Slave. Both of them are tied up, pinioned, with straps around their naked bodies. Leather straps? The marble cannot tell us. But the sense of constraint is palpable as you look up at the outsized unfinished figures. It’s clear why they got their nicknames: one struggles with his bonds, pushes forward, hunching, into the air; the other swoons erotically, as if not only accepting but embracing death. Where on earth did Michelangelo get such a startling idea? He was inspired, it has seemed fairly clear for the past seve
