Little David Crosses the Ocean

In his fifties, Michelangelo began work on a new and smaller version of his 18-ft. marble masterpiece in Florence, the David. He never quite finished it. This week the little David was aboard the U.S.S. Grand Canyon, bound for the National Gallery of Art in Washington. It will have its first U.S. showing during Harry Truman's inauguration.

The first David had represented the young champion of a race--naked, frowning, indomitable, his murderous, swollen-looking right hand hanging loose at his side. The second version, done about 25 years later, had a softer, more subjective air; the boy's body was twisted like a flame and his head bowed dreamily over one shoulder.

In agreeing to lend the little David as a token of "friendly feelings" toward the U.S., Italy's Fine Arts Commission broke a Mussolini-enacted law against exporting Italian art treasures. Never before has a Michelangelo statue--actually carved by Michelangelo, that is--been exhibited in the U.S.

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