Health care reform may be dead in the water, but at least the ripple effect of a new US administration has stirred up some priceless works of art. In a motion symbolizing the “strong ties of friendship that continue to bind both countries,” the French Embassy has made the gracious decision to give one of the most underrecognized works of art in the world the spotlight it deserves.
From the French Embassy press release:
The Marble Boy, a fragmentary marble statue of a nude young boy attributed to Michelangelo, will make its way across Fifth Avenue from the headquarters of the French Cultural Services in the United States to The Metropolitan Museum of Art. France has agreed to loan the intensely lyrical work, the only statue in the Western Hemisphere widely attributed to the Renaissance master, to the American museum for a 10-year period, as a symbol of the strong ties of friendship that continue to bind both countries, and to give the general public a better opportunity to view the marble.
Can anyone imagine this happening a few years ago?
MORE:
France Loans Michelangelo’s Marble Boy to the Metropolitian Museum of Art [FrenchCulture.org]
NYC’s Met Museum to Get Reputed Michelangelo Work [AP/NY Times]