How does this artwork elucidate its Influence?
The discovery of the Laocoön made a great impression on Italian artists and continued to influence Italian art into the Baroque period. Michelangelo is known to have been particularly impressed by the massive scale of the work and its sensuous Hellenistic aesthetic, particularly its depiction of the male figures. The influence of the Laocoön, as well as the Belvedere Torso, is evidenced in many of Michelangelo's later sculptures, such as the Rebellious Slave and the Dying Slave, created for the tomb of Pope Julius II.  Several of the ignudi and the figure of Haman in the Sistine Chapel ceiling draw on the figures.  Raphael used the face of Laocoön for his Homer in his Parnassus in the Raphael Rooms, expressing blindness rather than pain.The Florentine sculptor Baccio Bandinelli was commissioned to make a copy by the Medici Pope Leo X. Bandinelli's version, which was often copied and distributed in small bronzes, is in the Uffizi Gallery, Florence, the Pope having decided it was too good to send to François I of France as originally intended. A bronze casting, made for François I at Fontainebleau from a mold taken from the original under the supervision of Primaticcio, is at the Musée du Louvre.  There are many copies of the statue, including a well-known one in the Grand Palace of the Knights of St. John in Rhodes. Many still show the arm in the outstretched position, but the copy in Rhodes has been corrected.
The group was rapidly depicted in prints as well as small models, and became known all over Europe. Titian appears to have had access to a good cast or reproduction from about 1520, and echoes of the figures begin to appear in his works, two of them in the Averoldi Altarpiece of 1520–1522.  A woodcut, probably after a drawing by Titian, parodied the sculpture by portraying three apes instead of humans. It has often been interpreted as a satire on the clumsiness of Bandinelli's copy, or as a commentary on debates of the time around the similarities between human and ape anatomy. It has also been suggested that this woodcut was one of a number of Renaissance images that were made to reflect contemporary doubts as to the authenticity of the Laocoön Group, the 'aping' of the statue referring to the incorrect pose of the Trojan priest who was depicted in ancient art in the traditional sacrificial pose, with his leg raised to subdue the bull. Over 15 drawings of the group made by Rubens in Rome have survived, and the influence of the figures can be seen in many of his major works, including his Descent from the Cross in Antwerp Cathedral.The original was seized and taken to Paris by Napoleon Bonaparte after his conquest of Italy in 1799, and installed in a place of honour in the Musée Napoléon at the Louvre. Following the fall of Napoleon, it was returned by the Allies to the Vatican in 1816.
Napoleon Sistine Chapel Raphael Haman Uffizi Trojan Antwerp Cathedral Titian Musée Napoléon Raphael Rooms Musée du Louvre Florence Florentine Hellenistic Parnassus Sistine Chapel ceiling Grand Palace Laocoön Homer Napoleon Bonaparte Baccio Bandinelli Louvre Primaticcio Knights of St. John Rhodes Baroque Pope Leo X prints Descent from the Cross Belvedere Torso Dying Slave ignudi Michelangelo Fontainebleau Rubens Averoldi Altarpiece Pope Julius II woodcut François I of France Rebellious Slave