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Michelangelo's famous paintings fit on a short list, because he never much wanted to paint. He saw himself as a sculptor. Only four panel paintings are generally accepted as his, just one of them finished, and everything else that survives is fresco in two Vatican chapels. So the ten below cover all of it, ranked roughly from the images everyone knows to the ones almost nobody gets to see.
If you're planning a trip, or weighing which Michelangelo paintings to copy for a wall at home, start at the ceiling and work down.
Ten paintings, from the ceiling to a boy's first panel
1. The Sistine Chapel ceiling, 1508–1512
Sistine Chapel, Vatican City. The contract Michelangelo signed on 8 May 1508 asked for twelve apostles. Reluctant at first (he suggested his young rival Raphael), he pushed for a grander scheme and was allowed, in his words, "to do as I liked." The finished ceiling holds over 300 figures around nine Genesis scenes, and it was done by 31 October 1512. He painted it standing up, not lying on his back.
2. The Creation of Adam, 1508–1512
Sistine Chapel ceiling, the fourth of nine Genesis scenes, finished in 1511. God reaches toward Adam, and their index fingers never touch: the gap is about 3/4 inch (1.9 cm). It's one of the most replicated religious paintings of all time. In 1990 a physician argued in the Journal of the American Medical Association that the shapes behind God form a picture of the human brain.
3. The Last Judgment, 1536–1541
Altar wall, Sistine Chapel. The commission came from Pope Clement VII; Michelangelo began 25 years after the ceiling and finished under Paul III. Over 300 figures crowd it, nearly all the men and angels originally nude. When the pope's Master of Ceremonies, Biagio da Cesena, objected, Michelangelo gave his face to Minos, judge of the underworld, with donkey ears. Look at the flayed skin Saint Bartholomew holds: the face on it is usually taken as Michelangelo's own. After a ruling tied to the Council of Trent in 1564, Daniele da Volterra painted drapery over the genitals and was nicknamed il braghettone, the breeches maker.
4. The Holy Family for Agnolo Doni, 1505–1506
Florence. This round Holy Family, 120 cm (47 1/2 in) across, hangs in the Uffizi room shared with Raphael, and it's the only finished panel painting by Michelangelo to survive. He made it for Agnolo Doni, a Florentine merchant who married Maddalena Strozzi in 1504. The nudes leaning on the wall behind the family borrow from the Laocoön, the ancient group dug up in January 1506. Michelangelo designed the carved frame too.
5. The Torment of Saint Anthony, 1487–1488
Fort Worth, Texas. This small demon-filled panel is his first known painting, made at 12 or 13 from an engraving by the German master Martin Schongauer. He went to a market to draw fish scales, and one demon has scales the engraving lacks. Sotheby's sold it in 2008 as a Ghirlandaio workshop picture; study at the Metropolitan Museum of Art then confirmed it as Michelangelo's, and the Kimbell Art Museum bought it in 2009. It's the only Michelangelo painting in North or South America.
6. The Libyan Sibyl, 1508–1512
Sistine Chapel ceiling, near the altar. One of five sibyls set among seven prophets, she turns away from you in richly colored robes, right foot pressed to the floor. That foot became big news. A red chalk study of it, about five inches tall, surfaced when its owner, who had inherited it, sent a photo to the auction house through Christie's online portal. Estimated at up to $2 million, it sold on February 5, 2026 for $27.2 million with fees. The previous auction record for Michelangelo was $24.3 million.
7. The Entombment, about 1500–1501
London. Commissioned in 1500 for a funerary chapel in Sant'Agostino, Rome, this panel was left unfinished when Michelangelo went back to Florence the next year, probably for the marble block that became David. The empty patch at lower right was probably meant for the kneeling Virgin; he may have been waiting for ultramarine, the costliest pigment, for her mantle. Some scholars think a pupil painted it from his drawing.
8. The Manchester Madonna, about 1494
London, in the same gallery as the Entombment. The Virgin sits on a rock with the Christ Child and the young John the Baptist. The nickname comes from the great Manchester art exhibition of 1857. It's unfinished too: the Virgin's cloak is still black, never given its final coats of blue, and the angels on the left are barely begun.
9. The Conversion of Saul, about 1542–1545
Pauline Chapel, Vatican Palace. Pope Paul III commissioned it for his namesake chapel. A beam of light shoots down from Christ, and Saul lies on the road to Damascus with the face of an old man, though Saul was about 30 at his conversion. Most people never see it in person, because tourists are not allowed into the chapel.
10. The Crucifixion of Saint Peter, about 1546–1550
Pauline Chapel, Vatican Palace. His last fresco, completed in 1550, the year he turned 75. Soldiers are raising Peter on his cross, and Michelangelo broke convention by having him twist his neck to look straight at you. The restoration finished in 2009 turned up a figure at upper left, in a red tunic and blue turban, believed to be the painter himself.
How many paintings did he actually make?
Very few. Four panel paintings are generally accepted as his: the Saint Anthony in Texas, the Manchester Madonna, the Entombment and the Doni Holy Family, and only the last is finished. Everything else that survives is fresco in two Vatican chapels, the Sistine and the Pauline.
Two more are lost. The Battle of Cascina, for the Palazzo Vecchio in Florence, never got past the preparatory drawing before Pope Julius II called him to Rome. Leda and the Swan (1530) went to France, where Queen Anne of Austria had it destroyed in the 17th century; the best-known copy is in London's National Gallery.
Did Leonardo da Vinci know Michelangelo?
Yes, as a rival. The Battle of Cascina was meant to face Leonardo's Battle of Anghiari across the same hall, and neither was finished. Leonardo also sat on the committee of 30 Florentine citizens that decided where David would stand.
Where are Michelangelo's famous paintings located?
Six of the ten are in Vatican City. London has two, and Florence and Fort Worth have one each.
| Painting | Date | Where |
|---|---|---|
| Sistine Chapel ceiling, The Creation of Adam, The Libyan Sibyl | 1508–1512 | Sistine Chapel, Vatican City |
| The Last Judgment | 1536–1541 | Sistine Chapel, Vatican City |
| The Conversion of Saul, The Crucifixion of Saint Peter | about 1542–1550 | Pauline Chapel, Vatican City (closed to tourists) |
| Holy Family for Agnolo Doni | 1505–1506 | Uffizi Galleries, Florence |
| The Entombment, The Manchester Madonna | about 1494–1501 | National Gallery, London |
| The Torment of Saint Anthony | 1487–1488 | Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas |
What is his most famous art piece?
Counting sculpture, it's David (1501–1504), in Florence's Galleria dell'Accademia since 1873 and one of the most recognized works of Renaissance sculpture. In painting, it's the Sistine Chapel ceiling, and its best-known scene is The Creation of Adam. For other painters in the same league, start with the paintings everyone can name.
Bring the Saint Anthony home
Only one of Michelangelo's paintings hangs in the United States, and at 47 × 35 cm it's a size that works on a living room wall. Art & See offers it as a hand-painted oil copy, demons, fish scales and all, alongside the rest of the Michelangelo work in the studio.
Sources
- Vatican Museums, Sistine Chapel ceiling
- Vatican Museums, The Last Judgement
- Uffizi Galleries, Holy Family (Doni Tondo)
- National Gallery, London, The Entombment
- National Gallery, London, The Manchester Madonna
- KERA News, Michelangelo's first painting at the Kimbell
- Smithsonian Magazine, the Libyan Sibyl foot study
- Galerie Magazine, the $27.2 million sale
