The “Madonna of the Stairs” was carved when Michelangelo was only 17 years old and allegedly living in the Medici household. Michelangelo applied the “relievo schiacciato” (squashed relief) technique, which was invented by Donatello earlier in the century. Showing a sleeping Christ child on the lap of his melancholic mother as wingless angels playfully climb up and down a staircase (where the sculpture gets its name), the sculpture foreshadows Michelangelo’s later “Pietà,” where Mary holds the dead body of her adult son. Buona visione!