David is the work of Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, the legendary Florentine sculptor and polymath. His greatest sculpture came to be the defining work of the Renaissance.

It was first commissioned in 1464 to sit atop the roofline of Florence Cathedral, part of a series of Old Testament-themed sculptures. Two artists were tasked with the work before Michelangelo, but neither could successfully work the low-quality marble provided.

The block of Carrara marble was discarded until Michelangelo was called upon for the job, nearly 40 years after the original commission. He was in his mid-twenties at the time but already one of the finest sculptors alive.

He started work in 1501 at 26 years of age and took just over 2 years. Once finished, it was clearly too perfect, and too large, to be hoisted atop the cathedral. It was displayed instead at the Palazzo della Signoria, its famous glare facing towards Rome.

Carved from a single block, the colossal statue is 17 feet tall - equivalent to a 2-story building. That the young genius achieved something so perfect at this scale, and hewn from a damaged block of stone, is almost miraculous.

Because it was intended to be gazed up at from ground level, Michelangelo carved certain elements deliberately out of proportion, with an exaggerated head, facial features, arms and hands.

He worked masterfully around the limitations of the stone. David is relatively slim and his head is pointed to the side, because the block was too narrow to face forward. His contrapposto poise accounted for a hole that already existed in the marble between the legs.

The work was also groundbreaking in style. Earlier interpretations of David, such as by Donatello and Verrocchio, depicted him victorious over the already slain Goliath.

Michelangelo instead showed him at the precipice of battle. His intense stare and furrowed brow depict a contemplative moment - David will confront the challenge with a focused, rational mind.

David was the result of detailed anatomical studies by the great polymath - modern examinations have found it to be absolutely perfect, except for one small muscle missing in the back. Michelangelo was aware of this, as he wrote that he was limited by a defect in the marble.

But the genius of David was not just its anatomical accuracy. It came to represent the very notion of ideal human form and proportion - an interpretation of the common ancient Greek theme of the ideal male figure.

Today, over 1 million people visit David every year. But it was revered in its own time too - 16th Century Renaissance painter Giorgio Vasari said that it surpassed "all ancient and modern statues, whether Greek or Latin, that have ever existed."

Michelangelo said of his method: "In every block of marble I see a statue as plain as though it stood before me, shaped and perfect in attitude and action. I have only to hew away the rough walls that imprison the lovely apparition to reveal it to the other eyes as mine see it."