Giovanni Angelo Montorsoli

Giovanni Angelo Montorsoli
Portrait of Giovanni Angelo Montorsoli from the 1568 edition of Le vite de' piv eccellenti pittori, scvltori, et architettori by Giorgio Vasari (Florence: Giunti)
Born	1507 Montorsoli, Florence
Died	31 August 1563 Florence
Nationality	Florentine
Education	pupil of Michelangelo Buonarroti
Known for	sculpture

Giovanni Angelo Montorsoli (1507 – 31 August 1563), also known as Giovanni Agnolo Montorsoli, was a Florentine sculptor and Servite friar. He is today as often remembered for his restorations of famous classical works as his original creations.

Giovanni Montorsoli was born in 1507 at Montorsoli, now in the comune of Vaglia, north of Florence, the son of Michele d'Angelo da Poggibonsi. From 1521 to 1534 he was employed as an assistant to Michelangelo Buonarroti at the Medici Chapel (Sacrestia Nuova) and in the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana at the Basilica of San Lorenzo in Florence. Montorsoli is known to have sculpted St. Cosmas with another of Michelangelo's assistants, Raffaello da Montelupo, after a model by the master. He became a friar of the Servite Order, but continued to work as a sculptor.

In 1532-1533 he produced his Drunken Satyr. This sculpture was probably intended for a wall fountain, possibly situated in a niche where the water would have flown from the open neck of the satyr's wineskin. This would have been in a style very popular at the time in Rome. Due to the large number of ancient sculptures in Rome, these tended to be utilised rather than commissioning a new figure. However, in Florence ancient statuary was much less common. Montorsoli's Satyr, with its classical theme and distinctly classical style, was intended to fill the void.

In 1532 he was summoned by Pope Clement VII to the Belvedere courtyard to restore many of the antique sculptures there. This included the Laocoön and his Sons group and the Belvedere Apollo. Restoration methods in that era entailed reworking sculptures in accordance with contemporary principles which often were at odds with the aesthetics of antiquity. For instance, Montorsoli included a new right arm in the central figure of the Laocoön group, upraised in a gesture of defiance, adding much to the fame of the sculpture and himself. However, when the original limb was found in 1905 in Rome and reattached to the Laocoön schulpture, replacing Montorsoli's work, the original was revealed to be folded at the elbow with considerably less flourish.