The Deposition (Michelangelo)

The dead Christ slumps between three mourners, his body folding in a long S-curve as the hooded figure of Nicodemus steadies him from behind. Michelangelo, by now in his seventies, carved this for his own tomb and gave Nicodemus his own face - a self-portrait grieving over the Savior. Dissatisfied, and finding a flaw in the marble, he took a hammer to the group and broke off Christ's left leg before abandoning it; a pupil later pieced parts back together and finished the Magdalene. The unfinished surfaces, half-emerging from the raw stone, make it one of his most personal works.