or years directors at the
Galleria dell'Accademia
art museum in Florence,
Italy, have been playing
a very dangerous game.
None of the more than
1.5 million visitors who
flock to the Accademia
annually wants to miss
seeing Michelangelo’s David, the
most famous sculpture in art history.
But little do admiring visitors suspect
that this magnificent statue, which
stands 17 feet high and weighs more
than 6 tons, could come crashing
down at any moment. That would be
a sheer catastrophe: not because of
its inestimable monetary value, but
because one of the world’s greatest
art treasures would be lost forever.The National Research Council of
Italy explains the problem: “Micro-
fractures visible on the left ankle and
the carved tree stump threaten the
stability of the sculpture.” They were
caused during the hundreds of years
that the statue stood outside on the
Piazza della Signoria before beingIn 1504 the renowned
Italian Renaissance
artist Michelangelo
had finished sculpting
the biblical hero David
from a single block of Carrara marble,
depicting him moments before he’d
fought and killed the giant Goliath.
Today it is one of the most important
works in art history and an emblem for
the city of Florence.moved to the Accademia in 1873.
There the stature stood at a slight
angle, which was enough to put huge
additional strain on its ankles. Today
the museum carefully maintains the
statue in a vertical position, however
no one has any control over another
potential devastator—earthquakes.
Flore nce lie s nea r a numbe r of ac tive
fault lines and has been hit before.
Several earthquakes in 1895 were
severe enough that people had to
sleep in the streets so as not to be
trapped beneath rubble in the night.LATE RESCUE OPERATION
Restorers at the Accademia are trying to
repair hundreds of years of damage from
erosion and clean off accumulated grime.
The many tiny holes of the original marble
have made it deteriorate faster than other
types of marble. Furthermore, weathering
pockmarked the face over the centuries.i
F