Risen Christ

Metello Vari, a Roman aristocrat, commissioned the piece in June 1514, specifying merely that the naked standing figure hold the Cross in his arms, but leaving the composition largely to Michelangelo.

Around 1515, Michelangelo began working on a roughed-out version of this statue at his workshop in Macello dei Corvi, but he abandoned it when he found a black vein in the white marble.

In 1519-1520, a new version was rapidly inserted to fulfill the contract’s stipulations. Michelangelo worked on it in Florence, and the trip to Rome and finishing touches were assigned to an apprentice, Pietro Urbano; however, the latter damaged the work and had to be replaced swiftly by Federico Frizzi.

The Risen Christ, or Cristo della Minerva in Italian, is a marble sculpture completed in 1521. It is also known as Christ the Redeemer or Christ Carrying the Cross. It’s to the left of the main altar of Rome’s Santa Maria sopra Minerva church.