David from on High – Weston Cast Court, Victoria and Albert Museum, South Kensington, London, England

Michelangelo’s David was the museum’s first major cast of Italian figure sculpture. It was acquired in 1857 when it was sent as a gift from the Grand Duke of Tuscany to Queen Victoria — apparently in an attempt to placate English anger at his refusal to allow the National Gallery to export Domenico Ghirlandaio’s Madonna Enthroned. The gift was entirely unexpected and the Queen promptly gave the cast to the then South Kensington Museum which is now the Victoria and Albert Museum. In the reign of Queen Victoria, the display of male nudity was contentious and the Queen herself was said to find it shocking. The museum commissioned a suitably proportioned fig leaf that was kept in readiness in case of a visit by the Queen or other female dignitary: the fig leaf was then hung on the figure using a pair of hooks. Today, the fig leaf is no longer used, but it is displayed in a case at the back of the cast’s plinth.