Michelangelo's first painting, created when he was 12 or 13

This visually resembles Falling Bough by Walton Ford

https://www.kasmingallery.com/artworks/4717-walton-ford-fall...

I don't trust this for one bit. For the owners there is quite the incentive to label this as the work of a genius. But in reality, this is just pretty complex for a 12 year-old to produce by yourself.

Edit: as others have pointed out, and if I were to actually read the article carefully before commenting, the composition is not attributed to Michelangelo. So it is just a copy. Quite the achievement, but possible for a twelve-year old.

I once confronted a gallery owner who was proudly presenting a newly discovered work by Mondriaan [1]. An original black and white photo in an old newspaper [2] was shown as proof of authenticity. But many details such as the creases in fabric differ in the original and the new painting. No OpenCV required to see that. Mind you, the picture is already framed with Mondriaan standing next to it. Unlikely that he's still working on it.

Instead of responding, the gallery owner simply turned away.

[1] https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/bb/Cavalini...

[2] https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/nl/2022/03/02/nieuwe-werken-mondri...

If you just want to see the painting without all the ads: https://cdn8.openculture.com/2026/01/14225354/1920px-Michela...

Something about this painting is reminiscent of the way I(and I'm sure many others) would paint my comic-book heroes at around that age, albeit perhaps lacking some of Michelangelo's talents and skills.

This painting makes me feel like the bible was pretty much a comic book to the adolescent Michelangelo, and I like that thought. He later went on to paint the ceiling of a huge temple dedicated to his equivalent of Charles Xavier.

I bet that felt pretty cool for him =)

Surely this isn’t the first thing he ever painted, but rather the earliest known work that survived?

This is just a summary of the the Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Torment_of_Saint_Anthony

It's mentioned in the article that this is a (really good!) painted version of The Torment of Saint Anthony, an engraving by Martin Schongauer.

Michelangelo would go on to find his first patron, a Cardinal named Raffaele Riario, by forging a sculpture and artificially aging it (which, back then, was a conventional practice to demonstrate expertise and skill: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/how-a-forged-sculpture...)

Dishonesty aside, both stories are reminders that there's a power to doing stuff with your own two hands (not genning it), as well as not to let today's emphasis on originality take away from using imitation/transcription to practice your craft: https://herbertlui.net/in-defense-of-copycats/

Do they mean that he grabbed a paintbrush one day and painted this out of the blue? Or does "painting" here mean "specifically painted on a canvas" or whatever?

If my 12-year-old painted that, I would call a priest for an exorcism.

The interesting thing in Michelangelo's case is that he viewed himself primarily as a sculptor. He was more or less forced against his will to paint the Sistine Chapel. And yet he was a master of the medium.

Must be his earliest work we know, not the first painting he did, because this is too good.

I'm surprised at how few parents understand what it takes to create a great artist. You need to start when they're 5 (or preferably younger), put them in a workshop with great artists/pedagogues etc. (costly!) where they work full time (forget school), evaluate potential and there is a tiny chance they themselves will become great. Annoyed by parents talking about their 5 year olds as "too young" or when they recommend their teenager to 'pursue their dream' when they don't provide a fraction of above. It's still possible but odds go down dramatically.

What a crazy coincidence... I had not been to the Kimbell art musesum that is only about 20 minutes away from me in many years. We had a family outing this weekend to go see the Torlonia Collection exhibit there and this painting was just sitting there in their permanent collection! I even got to listen to the guided tour group that happened to be at that painting as I was walking by.

I don't want to compare anyone to Michelangelo, but the opening sentence of the aticle is more than flawed. My daughter got some painting classes in that age, and I saw work of some gifted kids. A bit better than "directionless doodles, chaotic comics, and a few unsteady-at-best school projects".

I’m enjoying the thought of seeing this in the state fair art gallery next to the other seventh grade art.

It’s wild that someone could be that good that young.

One thing is to invent such a picture, the other is to copy it almost 1:1 and add some touch, which was the case.

Wonder if we replace the demons with the various things which today try to capture our attention?

Or the massive chemical swings we self-induce, and how those might tear at (or help??) our soul?

That picture was always freaky to me as a kid.

Other than the drawing skill here, it's interesting why a kid thinks about demons attacking god. And why demons look like that for him.

well the man would have loved to have a chat with H.P. Lovecraft it seems

Not his first painting. Nobody picks up a brush for the first time and paints like that. Not an original work either. Just a practice masterstudy, one of many many many he'd made up to that point I'm sure.

I'm inclined to agree with the commenter on the article.

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I wonder how many Michelangelos we'd have today if we didn't have electronic distraction devices and only had old school tech for "entertainment"