Everyone knows Michelangelo’s famous Pieta in Rome, in St Peters in the Vatican, but the sculptor worked on another of the same theme near the end of his life, from around 1555 to his death in 1564 at the age of 88. It was great to see it, for the first time, a couple of days ago in the Castello Sforza in Milan. The sculpture is unfinished and gives the impression of a three-dimensional sketch in marble. This image shows the faces of Mary and Christ, just roughed out and displaying the chisel marks of the work. By this time the artist must have had pain in every one of his joints. Perhaps he hoped that the same pity evoked in the statue would be extended to him when his soul was judged.