Michelangelo

Page semi-protected
Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Michelangelo
Portrait by Daniele da Volterra, c. 1545
Born
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni

6 March 1475
Died18 February 1564(1564-02-18) (aged 88)
Known for
  • Sculpture
  • painting
  • architecture
  • poetry
Notable work
Movement
Signature

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (Italian:

Renaissance man, along with his rival and elder contemporary, Leonardo da Vinci.[3] Given the sheer volume of surviving correspondence, sketches, and reminiscences, Michelangelo is one of the best-documented artists of the 16th century. He was lauded by contemporary biographers as the most accomplished artist of his era.[4][5]

Michelangelo achieved fame early. Two of his best-known works, the Pietà and David, were sculpted before the age of thirty. Although he did not consider himself a painter, Michelangelo created two of the most influential frescoes in the history of Western art: the scenes from Genesis on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome, and The Last Judgment on its altar wall. His design of the Laurentian Library pioneered Mannerist architecture.[6] At the age of 71, he succeeded Antonio da Sangallo the Younger as the architect of St. Peter's Basilica. Michelangelo transformed the plan so that the Western end was finished to his design, as was the dome, with some modification, after his death.

Michelangelo was the first Western artist whose biography was published while he was alive.[3] Three biographies were published during his lifetime. One of them, by Giorgio Vasari, proposed that Michelangelo's work transcended that of any artist living or dead, and was "supreme in not one art alone but in all three."[7]

In his lifetime, Michelangelo was often called Il Divino ("the divine one").[8] His contemporaries admired his terribilità—his ability to instill a sense of awe in viewers of his art. Attempts by subsequent artists to imitate[9] the expressive physicality of Michelangelo's style contributed to the rise of Mannerism, a short-lived movement in Western art between the High Renaissance and the Baroque.

Life

Early life, 1475–1488

Michelangelo was born on 6 March 1475

Matilde di Canossa—a claim that remains unproven, but which Michelangelo believed.[13]

Several months after Michelangelo's birth, the family returned to Florence, where he was raised. During his mother's later prolonged illness, and after her death in 1481 (when he was six years old), Michelangelo lived with a nanny and her husband, a stonecutter, in the town of Settignano, where his father owned a marble quarry and a small farm.[12] There he gained his love for marble. As Giorgio Vasari quotes him:

If there is some good in me, it is because I was born in the subtle atmosphere of your country of Arezzo. Along with the milk of my nurse I received the knack of handling chisel and hammer, with which I make my figures.[11]

Apprenticeships, 1488–1492

The Madonna of the Stairs (1490–1492), Michelangelo's earliest known work in marble

As a young boy, Michelangelo was sent to

Humanist Francesco da Urbino.[11][14][b] He showed no interest in his schooling, preferring to copy paintings from churches and seek the company of other painters.[14]

The city of Florence was at that time Italy's greatest centre of the arts and learning.

San Lorenzo's and Santo Spirito, which embodied the Classical precepts.[17] The sculptor Lorenzo Ghiberti had laboured for fifty years to create the north and east bronze doors of the Baptistry, which Michelangelo was to describe as "The Gates of Paradise".[18] The exterior niches of the Church of Orsanmichele contained a gallery of works by the most acclaimed sculptors of Florence: Donatello, Ghiberti, Andrea del Verrocchio, and Nanni di Banco.[16] The interiors of the older churches were covered with frescos (mostly in Late Medieval, but also in the Early Renaissance style), begun by Giotto and continued by Masaccio in the Brancacci Chapel, both of whose works Michelangelo studied and copied in drawings.[19]

During Michelangelo's childhood, a team of painters had been called from Florence to the Vatican to decorate the walls of the Sistine Chapel. Among them was Domenico Ghirlandaio, a master in fresco painting, perspective, figure drawing and portraiture who had the largest workshop in Florence.[16] In 1488, at age 13, Michelangelo was apprenticed to Ghirlandaio.[20] The next year, his father persuaded Ghirlandaio to pay Michelangelo as an artist, which was rare for someone of fourteen.[21] When in 1489, Lorenzo de' Medici, de facto ruler of Florence, asked Ghirlandaio for his two best pupils, Ghirlandaio sent Michelangelo and Francesco Granacci.[22]

From 1490 to 1492, Michelangelo attended the

Pico della Mirandola and Poliziano.[23] At this time, Michelangelo sculpted the reliefs Madonna of the Stairs (1490–1492) and Battle of the Centaurs (1491–1492),[19] the latter based on a theme suggested by Poliziano and commissioned by Lorenzo de' Medici.[24] Michelangelo worked for a time with the sculptor Bertoldo di Giovanni. When he was seventeen, another pupil, Pietro Torrigiano, struck him on the nose, causing the disfigurement that is conspicuous in the portraits of Michelangelo.[25]

Bologna, Florence, and Rome, 1492–1499

Pietà, St Peter's Basilica (1498–1499)

Lorenzo de' Medici's death on 8 April 1492 brought a reversal of Michelangelo's circumstances.

anatomical studies of the corpses from the church's hospital.[27] This was the first of several instances during his career that Michelangelo studied anatomy by dissecting cadavers.[28][29]

Between 1493 and 1494, he bought a block of marble, and carved a larger-than-life statue of

Piero de Medici, commissioned a statue made of snow, and Michelangelo again entered the court of the Medici.[30]

In the same year, the Medici were expelled from Florence as the result of the rise of

Cupid. According to Condivi, Lorenzo di Pierfrancesco de' Medici, for whom Michelangelo had sculpted St. John the Baptist, asked that Michelangelo "fix it so that it looked as if it had been buried" so he could "send it to Rome ... pass [it off as] an ancient work and ... sell it much better." Both Lorenzo and Michelangelo were unwittingly cheated out of the real value of the piece by a middleman. Cardinal Raffaele Riario, to whom Lorenzo had sold it, discovered that it was a fraud, but was so impressed by the quality of the sculpture that he invited the artist to Rome.[34] [d] This apparent success in selling his sculpture abroad as well as the conservative Florentine situation may have encouraged Michelangelo to accept the prelate's invitation.[33]

Michelangelo arrived in Rome on 25 June 1496[35] at the age of 21. On 4 July of the same year, he began work on a commission for Cardinal Riario, an over-life-size statue of the Roman wine god Bacchus. Upon completion, the work was rejected by the cardinal, and subsequently entered the collection of the banker Jacopo Galli, for his garden.[36][37]

In November 1497, the French ambassador to the Holy See, Cardinal

St Peter's Basilica
.

Florence, 1499–1505

David, completed by Michelangelo in 1504, is one of the most renowned works of the Renaissance.

Michelangelo returned to Florence in 1499. The

Botticelli, Leonardo da Vinci, Filippino Lippi, Pietro Perugino, Lorenzo di Credi, Antonio and Giuliano da Sangallo, Andrea della Robbia, Cosimo Rosselli, Davide Ghirlandaio, Piero di Cosimo, Andrea Sansovino and Michelangelo's dear friend Francesco Granacci, was called together to decide upon its placement, ultimately the Piazza della Signoria, in front of the Palazzo Vecchio. It now stands in the Academia while a replica occupies its place in the square.[41] In the same period of placing the David, Michelangelo may have been involved in creating the sculptural profile on Palazzo Vecchio's façade known as the Importuno di Michelangelo. The hypothesis[42] on Michelangelo's possible involvement in the creation of the profile is based on the strong resemblance of the latter to a profile drawn by the artist, datable to the beginning of the 16th century, now preserved in the Louvre.[43]

With the completion of the David came another commission. In early 1504 Leonardo da Vinci had been commissioned to paint

Rubens and Michelangelo's by Bastiano da Sangallo.[44]

Also during this period, Michelangelo was commissioned by Angelo Doni to paint a "Holy Family" as a present for his wife, Maddalena Strozzi. It is known as the Doni Tondo and hangs in the Uffizi Gallery in its original magnificent frame, which Michelangelo may have designed.[45][46] He also may have painted the Madonna and Child with John the Baptist, known as the Manchester Madonna and now in the National Gallery, London.[47]

Tomb of Julius II, 1505–1545

Michelangelo's second design for the monument of Pope Julius II

In 1505 Michelangelo was invited back to Rome by the newly elected Pope Julius II and commissioned to build the Pope's tomb,[2] which was to include forty statues and be finished in five years.[48] Under the patronage of the pope, Michelangelo experienced constant interruptions to his work on the tomb in order to accomplish numerous other tasks.

The commission for the tomb forced the artist to leave Florence with his planned Battle of Cascina painting unfinished.[49][50][51] By this time, Michelangelo was established as an artist;[52] both he and Julius II had hot tempers and soon argued.[50][51] On 17 April 1506, Michelangelo left Rome in secret for Florence, remaining there until the Florentine government pressed him to return to the pope.[51]

Although Michelangelo worked on the tomb for 40 years, it was never finished to his satisfaction.

Louvre.[48]

Sistine Chapel ceiling, 1508 –1512

Michelangelo painted the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel; the work took approximately four years to complete (1508–1512).

During the same period, Michelangelo painted the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel,

genealogy of Christ. The work is part of a larger scheme of decoration within the chapel that represents much of the doctrine of the Catholic Church.[56]

The composition stretches over 500 square metres of ceiling

Deluge, the Prophet Jeremiah, and the Cumaean Sibyl
.

Florence under Medici popes, 1513 – early 1534

In 1513, Pope Julius II died and was succeeded by Pope Leo X, the second son of Lorenzo de' Medici.[53] From 1513 to 1516, Pope Leo was on good terms with Pope Julius's surviving relatives, so encouraged Michelangelo to continue work on Julius's tomb, but the families became enemies again in 1516 when Pope Leo tried to seize the Duchy of Urbino from Julius's nephew Francesco Maria I della Rovere.[59] Pope Leo then had Michelangelo stop working on the tomb, and commissioned him to reconstruct the façade of the Basilica of San Lorenzo in Florence and to adorn it with sculptures. He spent three years creating drawings and models for the façade, as well as attempting to open a new marble quarry at Pietrasanta specifically for the project. In 1520, the work was abruptly cancelled by his financially strapped patrons before any real progress had been made. The basilica lacks a façade to this day.[60]

In 1520, the Medici came back to Michelangelo with another grand proposal, this time for a family funerary chapel in the Basilica of San Lorenzo.

Dawn. The chapel also contains Michelangelo's Medici Madonna.[61] In 1976, a concealed corridor was discovered with drawings on the walls that related to the chapel itself.[62][63]

Pope Leo X died in 1521 and was succeeded briefly by the austere Adrian VI, and then by his cousin Giulio Medici as Pope Clement VII.[64] In 1524, Michelangelo received an architectural commission from the Medici pope for the Laurentian Library at San Lorenzo's Church.[53] He designed both the interior of the library itself and its vestibule, a building utilising architectural forms with such dynamic effect that it is seen as the forerunner of Baroque architecture. It was left to assistants to interpret his plans and carry out construction. The library was not opened until 1571, and the vestibule remained incomplete until 1904.[65]

In 1527, Florentine citizens, encouraged by the sack of Rome, threw out the Medici and restored the republic. A siege of the city ensued, and Michelangelo went to the aid of his beloved Florence by working on the city's fortifications from 1528 to 1529. The city fell in 1530, and the Medici were restored to power,[53] with the young Alessandro Medici as the first Duke of Florence. Pope Clement, a Medici, sentenced Michelangelo to death. It is thought that Michelangelo hid for two months in a small chamber under the Medici chapels in the Basilica of San Lorenzo with light from just a tiny window, making many charcoal and chalk drawings which remained hidden until the room was rediscovered in 1975, and opened to small numbers of visitors in 2023. Michelangelo was eventually pardoned by the Medicis and the death sentence lifted, so that he could complete work on the Sistine Chapel and the Medici family tomb. He left Florence for Rome in 1534.[66] Despite Michelangelo's support of the republic and resistance to the Medici rule, Pope Clement reinstated an allowance that he had previously granted the artist and made a new contract with him over the tomb of Pope Julius.[67]

Rome, 1534–1546

The Last Judgment (1534–1541)

In Rome, Michelangelo lived near the church of

Santa Maria di Loreto. It was at this time that he met the poet Vittoria Colonna, marchioness of Pescara, who was to become one of his closest friends until her death in 1547.[68]

Shortly before his death in 1534, Pope Clement VII commissioned Michelangelo to paint a fresco of

Saint Bartholomew holds a drooping flayed skin, bearing the likeness of Michelangelo. The dead rise from their graves, to be consigned either to Heaven or to Hell.[69]

Once completed, the depiction of Christ and the Virgin Mary naked was considered sacrilegious, and Cardinal Carafa and Monsignor Sernini (Mantua's ambassador) campaigned to have the fresco removed or censored, but the Pope resisted. At the Council of Trent, shortly before Michelangelo's death in 1564, it was decided to obscure the genitals and Daniele da Volterra, an apprentice of Michelangelo, was commissioned to make the alterations.[70] An uncensored copy of the original, by Marcello Venusti, is in the Capodimonte Museum of Naples.[71]

Michelangelo worked on a number of architectural projects at this time. They included a design for the

Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore and the Porta Pia.[72]

St Peter's Basilica, 1546–1564

St Peter's Basilica

While still working on the Last Judgment, Michelangelo received yet another commission for the Vatican. This was for the painting of two large frescos in the Cappella Paolina depicting significant events in the lives of the two most important saints of Rome, the

Vita, including a biography of Michelangelo.[74]

In 1546, Michelangelo was appointed architect of

Banister Fletcher, "the greatest creation of the Renaissance".[76]

As construction was progressing on St Peter's, there was concern that Michelangelo would pass away before the dome was finished. However, once building commenced on the lower part of the dome, the supporting ring, the completion of the design was inevitable.

On 7 December 2007, a red chalk sketch for the dome of St Peter's Basilica, possibly the last made by Michelangelo before his death, was discovered in the Vatican archives. It is extremely rare, since he destroyed his designs later in life. The sketch is a partial plan for one of the radial columns of the cupola drum of St Peter's.[77]

Personal life

Ignudo fresco from 1509 on the Sistine Chapel ceiling
Speculation exists that this may be a drawing by Michelangelo that might portray Tommaso dei Cavalieri[78][79]

Faith

Michelangelo was a devout Catholic whose faith deepened at the end of his life.

better source needed
]

His poetry includes the following closing lines from what is known as poem 285 (written in 1554): "Neither painting nor sculpture will be able any longer to calm my soul, now turned toward that divine love that opened his arms on the cross to take us in."[82][83]

Personal habits

Michelangelo was abstemious in his personal life, and once told his apprentice, Ascanio Condivi: "However rich I may have been, I have always lived like a poor man."[84] Michelangelo's bank accounts and numerous deeds of purchase show that his net worth was about 50,000 gold ducats, more than many princes and dukes of his time.[85] Condivi said he was indifferent to food and drink, eating "more out of necessity than of pleasure"[84] and that he "often slept in his clothes and ... boots."[84] His biographer Paolo Giovio says, "His nature was so rough and uncouth that his domestic habits were incredibly squalid, and deprived posterity of any pupils who might have followed him."[86] This, however, may not have affected him, as he was by nature a solitary and melancholy person, bizzarro e fantastico, a man who "withdrew himself from the company of men."[87]

Relationships and poetry

Love for a lady's different. Not much
in that for a wise and virile lover's trouble.

— translation of Michelangelo work by John Frederick Nim

It is impossible to know whether Michelangelo had any physical relationships.[88] Understanding about his sexuality is rooted in his art, especially his poetry.[89] He wrote more than three hundred sonnets and madrigals. About sixty are addressed to men — "the first significant modern corpus of love poetry from one man to another".[90]

The longest sequence, displaying deep loving feeling, was written to the young Roman patrician

Lives of the Artists", Giorgio Vasari observed: "But infinitely more than any of the others he loved M. Tommaso de' Cavalieri, a Roman gentleman, for whom, being a young man and much inclined to these arts, [Michelangelo] made, to the end that he might learn to draw, many most superb drawings of divinely beautiful heads, designed in black and red chalk; and then he drew for him a Ganymede rapt to Heaven by Jove's Eagle, a Tityus with the Vulture devouring his heart, the Chariot of the Sun falling with Phaëthon into the Po, and a Bacchanal of children, which are all in themselves most rare things, and drawings the like of which have never been seen."[93] Some scholars downplay the relationship between Michelangelo and Cavalieri as one of platonic friendship.[94]
The poems to Cavalieri make up the first large sequence of poems in any modern tongue addressed by one man to another; they predate by 50 years to the fair youth:

I feel as lit by fire a cold countenance
That burns me from afar and keeps itself ice-chill;
A strength I feel two shapely arms to fill
Which without motion moves every balance.

— translation of Michelangelo work by Michael Sullivan

Cavalieri replied: "I swear to return your love. Never have I loved a man more than I love you, never have I wished for a friendship more than I wish for yours." Cavalieri remained devoted to Michelangelo until his death.[95]

In 1542, Michelangelo met

Gherardo Perini, shamelessly stole from him.[95]

The nature of the poetry has been a source of discomfort to later generations. Michelangelo's grandnephew, Michelangelo Buonarroti the Younger, published the poems in 1623 with the gender of pronouns changed; he also removed words or in other instances insisted that Michelangelo's poems be read allegorically and philosophically,[96][90] a judgment some modern scholars still repeat today.[95] It was not until John Addington Symonds translated the poems into English in 1893 that the original genders were restored. Since then it has become more accepted that his poems should be understood at face value, that is, as indicating his personal feelings and a preference by him for young men over women.[97]

Late in life, Michelangelo nurtured a friendship with the poet and noble widow Vittoria Colonna, whom he met in Rome in 1536 or 1538 and who was in her late forties at the time. They wrote sonnets for each other and were in regular contact until she died. These sonnets mostly deal with the spiritual issues that occupied them.[98] Condivi, who in his biography was preoccupied with downplaying Michelangelo's attraction to men,[90] alleged Michelangelo said his sole regret in life was that he did not kiss the widow's face in the same manner that he had her hand.[68]

Feuds with other artists

In a letter from late 1542, Michelangelo blamed the tensions between Julius II and him on the envy of Bramante and Raphael, saying of the latter, "all he had in art, he got from me". According to Gian Paolo Lomazzo, Michelangelo and Raphael met once: the former was alone, while the latter was accompanied by several others. Michelangelo commented that he thought he had encountered the chief of police with such an assemblage, and Raphael replied that he thought he had met an executioner, as they are wont to walk alone.[99]

Works

Madonna and Child

The Madonna of the Stairs is Michelangelo's earliest known work in marble. It is carved in shallow relief, a technique often employed by the master-sculptor of the early 15th century, Donatello, and others such as Desiderio da Settignano.[100] While the Madonna is in profile, the easiest aspect for a shallow relief, the child displays a twisting motion that was to become characteristic of Michelangelo's work. The Taddei Tondo of 1502 shows the Christ Child frightened by a Bullfinch, a symbol of the Crucifixion.[45] The lively form of the child was later adapted by Raphael in the Bridgewater Madonna. The Madonna of Bruges was, at the time of its creation, unlike other such statues depicting the Virgin proudly presenting her son. Here, the Christ Child, restrained by his mother's clasping hand, is about to step off into the world.[101] The Doni Tondo, depicting the Holy Family, has elements of all three previous works: the frieze of figures in the background has the appearance of a low-relief, while the circular shape and dynamic forms echo the Taddeo Tondo. The twisting motion present in the Madonna of Bruges is accentuated in the painting. The painting heralds the forms, movement and colour that Michelangelo was to employ on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.[45]

Male figure

The kneeling

God of Wine. The sculpture has all the traditional attributes, a vine wreath, a cup of wine and a fawn, but Michelangelo ingested an air of reality into the subject, depicting him with bleary eyes, a swollen bladder and a stance that suggests he is unsteady on his feet.[102] While the work is plainly inspired by Classical sculpture, it is innovative for its rotating movement and strongly three-dimensional quality, which encourages the viewer to look at it from every angle.[104]

In the so-called

Rodin who studied them at the Louvre.[106] The Atlas Slave is one of the later figures for Pope Julius' tomb. The works, known collectively as The Captives, each show the figure struggling to free itself, as if from the bonds of the rock in which it is lodged. The works give a unique insight into the sculptural methods that Michelangelo employed and his way of revealing what he perceived within the rock.[107]

Sistine Chapel ceiling

The Sistine Chapel ceiling was painted between 1508 and 1512.[53] The ceiling is a flattened barrel vault supported on twelve triangular pendentives that rise from between the windows of the chapel. The commission, as envisaged by Pope Julius II, was to adorn the pendentives with figures of the twelve apostles.[108] Michelangelo, who was reluctant to take the job, persuaded the Pope to give him a free hand in the composition.[109] The resultant scheme of decoration awed his contemporaries and has inspired other artists ever since.[110] The scheme is of nine panels illustrating episodes from the Book of Genesis, set in an architectonic frame. On the pendentives, Michelangelo replaced the proposed Apostles with Prophets and Sibyls who heralded the coming of the Messiah.[109]

The Sistine Chapel Ceiling (1508–1512)

Michelangelo began painting with the later episodes in the narrative, the pictures including locational details and groups of figures, the Drunkenness of Noah being the first of this group.[109] In the later compositions, painted after the initial scaffolding had been removed, Michelangelo made the figures larger.[109] One of the central images, The Creation of Adam is one of the best known and most reproduced works in the history of art.[58] The final panel, showing the Separation of Light from Darkness is the broadest in style and was painted in a single day. As the model for the Creator, Michelangelo has depicted himself in the action of painting the ceiling.[109]

As supporters to the smaller scenes, Michelangelo painted twenty youths who have variously been interpreted as angels, as muses, or simply as decoration. Michelangelo referred to them as "ignudi".[111] The figure reproduced may be seen in context in the above image of the Separation of Light from Darkness. In the process of painting the ceiling, Michelangelo made studies for different figures, of which some, such as that for The Libyan Sibyl have survived, demonstrating the care taken by Michelangelo in details such as the hands and feet.[112] The Prophet Jeremiah, contemplating the downfall of Jerusalem, is a self-portrait.

  • Studies for The Libyan Sibyl
    Studies for The Libyan Sibyl
  • The Libyan Sibyl (1511)
    The Libyan Sibyl (1511)
  • The Prophet Jeremiah (1511)
    The Prophet Jeremiah (1511)
  • Ignudo
    Ignudo

Figure compositions

Michelangelo's relief of the

]

The composition of the Battle of Cascina is known in its entirety only from copies,[114] as the original cartoon, according to Vasari, was so admired that it deteriorated and was eventually in pieces.[115] It reflects the earlier relief in the energy and diversity of the figures,[116] with many different postures, and many being viewed from the back, as they turn towards the approaching enemy and prepare for battle.[citation needed]

In The Last Judgment it is said that Michelangelo drew inspiration from a fresco by Melozzo da Forlì in Rome's Santi Apostoli. Melozzo had depicted figures from different angles, as if they were floating in the Heaven and seen from below. Melozzo's majestic figure of Christ, with windblown cloak, demonstrates a degree of foreshortening of the figure that had also been employed by Andrea Mantegna, but was not usual in the frescos of Florentine painters. In The Last Judgment Michelangelo had the opportunity to depict, on an unprecedented scale, figures in the action of either rising heavenward or falling and being dragged down.[citation needed]

In the two frescos of the Pauline Chapel, The Crucifixion of St. Peter and The Conversion of Saul, Michelangelo has used the various groups of figures to convey a complex narrative. In the Crucifixion of Peter soldiers busy themselves about their assigned duty of digging a post hole and raising the cross while various people look on and discuss the events. A group of horrified women cluster in the foreground, while another group of Christians is led by a tall man to witness the events. In the right foreground, Michelangelo walks out of the painting with an expression of disillusionment.[citation needed]

Architecture

Michelangelo's architectural commissions included a number that were not realised, notably the façade for Brunelleschi's Church of San Lorenzo in Florence, for which Michelangelo had a wooden model constructed, but which remains to this day unfinished rough brick. At the same church, Giulio de' Medici (later Pope Clement VII) commissioned him to design the Medici Chapel and the tombs of Giuliano and Lorenzo Medici.

architectural form."[118]

In 1546 Michelangelo produced the highly complex ovoid design for the pavement of the

Farnese Palace. In 1547 he took on the job of completing St Peter's Basilica, begun to a design by Bramante, and with several intermediate designs by several architects. Michelangelo returned to Bramante's design, retaining the basic form and concepts by simplifying and strengthening the design to create a more dynamic and unified whole.[119] Although the late 16th-century engraving depicts the dome as having a hemispherical profile, the dome of Michelangelo's model is somewhat ovoid and the final product, as completed by Giacomo della Porta, is more so.[119]

  • The vestibule of the Laurentian Library has Mannerist features which challenge the Classical order of Brunelleschi's adjacent church.
    The vestibule of the Laurentian Library has Mannerist features which challenge the Classical order of Brunelleschi's adjacent church.
  • Michelangelo's redesign of the ancient Capitoline Hill included a complex spiralling pavement with a star at its centre.
    Michelangelo's redesign of the ancient Capitoline Hill included a complex spiralling pavement with a star at its centre.
  • Michelangelo's design for St Peter's is both massive and contained, with the corners between the apsidal arms of the Greek Cross filled by square projections.
    Michelangelo's design for St Peter's is both massive and contained, with the corners between the apsidal arms of the Greek Cross filled by square projections.
  • The exterior is surrounded by a giant order of pilasters supporting a continuous cornice. Four small cupolas cluster around the dome.
    The exterior is surrounded by a giant order of pilasters supporting a continuous cornice. Four small cupolas cluster around the dome.

Final years

In his old age, Michelangelo created a number of Pietàs in which he apparently reflects upon mortality. They are heralded by the Victory, perhaps created for the tomb of Pope Julius II but left unfinished. In this group, the youthful victor overcomes an older hooded figure, with the features of Michelangelo.

The Pietà of Vittoria Colonna is a chalk drawing of a type described as "presentation drawings", as they might be given as a gift by an artist, and were not necessarily studies towards a painted work. In this image, Mary's upraised arms and hands are indicative of her prophetic role. The frontal aspect is reminiscent of

Basilica of Santa Maria Novella
, Florence.

In the Florentine Pietà, Michelangelo again depicts himself, this time as the aged Nicodemus lowering the body of Jesus from the cross into the arms of Mary his mother and Mary Magdalene. Michelangelo smashed the left arm and leg of the figure of Jesus. His pupil Tiberio Calcagni repaired the arm and drilled a hole in which to fix a replacement leg which was not subsequently attached. He also worked on the figure of Mary Magdalene.[120][121]

The last sculpture that Michelangelo worked on (six days before his death), the Rondanini Pietà, could never be completed because Michelangelo carved it away until there was insufficient stone. The legs and a detached arm remain from a previous stage of the work. As it remains, the sculpture has an abstract quality, in keeping with 20th-century concepts of sculpture.[122][123]

Michelangelo died in Rome on 18 February 1564,

Basilica of Santa Croce, fulfilling the maestro's last request to be buried in his beloved Florence.[125]

Michelangelo's heir Lionardo Buonarroti commissioned

Cosimo I de' Medici, Duke of Tuscany, who had also organized a state funeral to honour Michelangelo in Florence.[126]

  • Self-portrait of the artist as Nicodemus
    Self-portrait of the artist as Nicodemus
  • Statue of Victory (1534), Palazzo Vecchio, Florence
    Statue of Victory (1534), Palazzo Vecchio, Florence
  • The Pietà of Vittoria Colonna (c. 1540)
    The Pietà of Vittoria Colonna (c. 1540)
  • The Rondanini Pietà (1552–1564)
    The Rondanini Pietà (1552–1564)

Legacy

Tomb of Michelangelo (1578) by Giorgio Vasari in Santa Croce, Florence

Michelangelo, with Leonardo da Vinci and Raphael, is one of the three giants of the Florentine High Renaissance. Although their names are often cited together, Michelangelo was younger than Leonardo by 23 years, and older than Raphael by eight. Because of his reclusive nature, he had little to do with either artist and outlived both of them by more than forty years.[citation needed] Michelangelo took few sculpture students. He employed Francesco Granacci, who was his fellow pupil at the Medici Academy, and became one of several assistants on the Sistine Chapel ceiling.[56] Michelangelo appears to have used assistants mainly for the more manual tasks of preparing surfaces and grinding colours. Despite this, his works were to have a great influence on painters, sculptors and architects for many generations to come.

While Michelangelo's David is the most famous male nude of all time, and copies of it now grace cities around the world, some of his other works have had perhaps even greater impact on the course of art. The twisting forms and tensions of the Victory, the Bruges Madonna and the Medici Madonna make them the heralds of the

Rodin and Henry Moore
.

Michelangelo's vestibule of the Laurentian Library was one of the earliest buildings to use classical forms in a plastic and expressive manner. This dynamic quality was later to find its major expression in his centrally planned St. Peter's, with its giant order, its rippling cornice and its upward-launching pointed dome. The dome of St. Peter's was to influence the building of churches for many centuries, including Sant'Andrea della Valle in Rome and St Paul's Cathedral, London, as well as the civic domes of many public buildings and the state capitals across America.

Artists who were directly influenced by Michelangelo include Raphael, whose monumental treatment of the figure in the

School of Athens and The Expulsion of Heliodorus from the Temple owes much to Michelangelo, and whose fresco of Isaiah in Sant'Agostino closely imitates the older master's prophets.[127] Other artists, such as Pontormo, drew on the writhing forms of the Last Judgment and the frescoes of the Cappella Paolina.[128]

The Sistine Chapel ceiling was a work of unprecedented grandeur, both for its architectonic forms, to be imitated by many Baroque ceiling painters, and also for the wealth of its inventiveness in the study of figures. Vasari wrote:

The work has proved a veritable beacon to our art, of inestimable benefit to all painters, restoring light to a world that for centuries had been plunged into darkness. Indeed, painters no longer need to seek for new inventions, novel attitudes, clothed figures, fresh ways of expression, different arrangements, or sublime subjects, for this work contains every perfection possible under those headings.[115]

In popular culture

See also

Footnotes

a. ^ Michelangelo's father marks the date as 6 March 1474 in the Florentine manner ab Incarnatione. However, in the Roman manner, ab Nativitate, it is 1475.
b. ^ Sources disagree as to how old Michelangelo was when he departed for school. De Tolnay writes that it was at ten years old while Sedgwick notes in her translation of Condivi that Michelangelo was seven.
c. ^ The Strozzi family acquired the sculpture Hercules. Filippo Strozzi sold it to Francis I in 1529. In 1594, Henry IV installed it in the Jardin d'Estang at Fontainebleau where it disappeared in 1713 when the Jardin d'Estange was destroyed.
d. ^ Vasari makes no mention of this episode and Paolo Giovio's Life of Michelangelo indicates that Michelangelo tried to pass the statue off as an antique himself.

References

  1. .
  2. ^ .
  3. ^ a b c Michelangelo at the Encyclopædia Britannica
  4. – via Google Books.
  5. – via Google Books.
  6. ^ Hughes, A., & Elam, C. (2003). "Michelangelo". Oxford Art Online. Retrieved 14 April 2018, from Oxford Art Online
  7. .
  8. .
  9. ^ Unione Montana dei Comuni della Valtiberina Toscana, www.cm-valtiberina.toscana.it
  10. ^ a b c J. de Tolnay, The Youth of Michelangelo, p. 11
  11. ^ a b C. Clément, Michelangelo, p. 5
  12. ^ A. Condivi, The Life of Michelangelo, p. 5
  13. ^ a b A. Condivi, The Life of Michelangelo, p. 9
  14. ^ a b Coughlan, Robert; (1978), The World of Michelangelo, Time-Life; pp. 14–15
  15. ^ a b c Coughlan, pp. 35–40
  16. ^ Giovanni Fanelli, (1980) Brunelleschi, Becocci Firenze, pp. 3–10
  17. ^ H. Gardner, p. 408
  18. ^ a b Coughlan, pp. 28–32
  19. ^ R. Liebert, Michelangelo: A Psychoanalytic Study of his Life and Images, p. 59
  20. ^ C. Clément, Michelangelo, p. 7
  21. ^ C. Clément, Michelangelo, p. 9
  22. ^ J. de Tolnay, The Youth of Michelangelo, pp. 18–19
  23. ^ a b A. Condivi, The Life of Michelangelo, p. 15
  24. ^ Coughlan, p. 42
  25. ^ a b J. de Tolnay, The Youth of Michelangelo, pp. 20–21
  26. ^ A. Condivi, The Life of Michelangelo, p. 17
  27. .
  28. ^ Zeybek, A.; Özkan, M. (August 2019). "Michelangelo and Anatomy". Anatomy: International Journal of Experimental & Clinical Anatomy. 13 (Supplement 2): S199.
  29. ^ Coughlan, Robert (1966). The World of Michelangelo: 1475–1564. et al. Time-Life Books. p. 67.
  30. ^ Bartz and König, p. 54
  31. ^ Miles Unger, Michelangelo: a Life in Six Masterpieces, ch. 1
  32. ^ a b J. de Tolnay, The Youth of Michelangelo, pp. 24–25
  33. ^ A. Condivi, The Life of Michelangelo, pp. 19–20
  34. ^ J. de Tolnay, The Youth of Michelangelo, pp. 26–28
  35. ^ Erin Sutherland Minter, "Discarded deity: The rejection of Michelangelo's Bacchus and the artist's response," Renaissance Studies 28, no. 3 (2013)
  36. ^ Luba Freedman, "Michelangelo's Reflections on Bacchus," Artibus et Historiae 24, no. 47 (2003)
  37. ^ a b Hirst and Dunkerton pp. 47–55
  38. ^ Vasari, Lives of the painters: Michelangelo
  39. ^ Paoletti and Radke, pp. 387–89
  40. ^ Goldscheider, p. 10
  41. ^ Marinazzo, Adriano (2020). "Una nuova possible attribuzione a Michelangelo. Il Volto Misterioso". Art e Dossier. 379: 76–81.
  42. ^ "Avant Banksy et Invader, Michel-Ange pionnier du street art dans les rues de Florence". LEFIGARO (in French). 22 November 2020. Retrieved 11 April 2021.
  43. ^ Paoletti and Radke, pp. 392–93
  44. ^ a b c Goldscheider, p. 11
  45. ^ Hirst and Dunkerton, p. 127
  46. ^ Hirst and Dunkerton, pp. 83–105, 336–46
  47. ^ a b c Goldscheider, pp. 14–16
  48. .
  49. ^ .
  50. ^ .
  51. .
  52. ^ a b c d e f g h i Bartz and König, p. 134
  53. ISSN 0394-0179
    .
  54. ^ Coughlan, p. 112
  55. ^ a b c d e Goldscheider, pp. 12–14
  56. ^ Bartz and König, p. 43
  57. ^ a b Marinazzo, Adriano (2022). "Michelangelo as the Creator. The self-portrait of the Buonarroti Archive, XIII, 111 r". Critica d'Arte (13–14): 99–107.
  58. ^ Miles Unger, Michelangelo: a Life in Six Masterpieces, ch. 5
  59. ^ Coughlan, pp. 135–36
  60. ^ Goldscheider, pp. 17–18
  61. ^ Coughlan, pp. 151–52
  62. ^ Bartz and König, p. 87
  63. ^ Giuffrida, Angela (31 October 2023). "Michelangelo's secret sketches under church in Florence open to public". The Guardian.
  64. ^ Coughlan, pp. 159–61
  65. ^ a b A. Condivi (ed. Hellmut Wohl), The Life of Michelangelo, p. 103, Phaidon, 1976.
  66. ^ a b Bartz and König, pp. 100–02
  67. ^ Bartz and König, pp. 102, 109
  68. ^ Goldscheider, pp. 19–20
  69. ^ Goldscheider, pp. 8, 21, 22
  70. ^ Bartz and Kŏnig, p. 16
  71. ^ Gardner, pp. 480–81
  72. ^ Banister Fletcher, 17th ed. p. 719
  73. ^ "Michelangelo 'last sketch' found". BBC News. 7 December 2007. Retrieved 9 February 2009.
  74. OCLC 551673496
    .
  75. .
  76. on 15 October 2015. Retrieved 24 October 2018.
  77. ^ "Are there any well-known or famous Secular Franciscans?". Secular Franciscan Order - USA. 25 April 2023. Retrieved 5 March 2024.
  78. ^ "Michelangelo, Selected Poems" (PDF). Columbia University. p. 20. Retrieved 24 October 2018.
  79. ^ "Michelangelo's Poetry". Michelangelo Gallery. Translated by Longfellow, H.W. Studio of the South. Retrieved 24 October 2018.
  80. ^ a b c Condivi, The Life of Michelangelo, p. 106.
  81. ^ Shirbon, Estelle. "Michelangelo more a prince than a pauper". LA Times. Archived from the original on 14 June 2023.
  82. ^ Paola Barocchi (ed.) Scritti d'arte del cinquecento, Milan, 1971; vol. I p. 10.
  83. ^ Condivi, p. 102.
  84. ^ Hughes, Anthony, "Michelangelo", p. 326. Phaidon, 1997.
  85. ^ Scigliano, Eric: "Michelangelo's Mountain; The Quest for Perfection in the Marble Quarries of Carrara" Archived 30 June 2009 at the Wayback Machine, Simon and Schuster, 2005. Retrieved 27 January 2007
  86. ^
    Met museum
    .
  87. .
  88. .
  89. ^ Vasari, Giorgio (1914). Lives of the most eminent painters, sculptors, and architects. Vol. IX. Translated by Gaston du C. De Vere. London: Medici Society. pp. 105–106.
  90. ^ According to Gayford (2013), "Whatever the strength of his feelings, Michelangelo's relationship with Tommaso de'Cavalieri is unlikely to have been a physical, sexual affair. For one thing, it was acted out through poems and images that were far from secret. Even if we do not choose to believe Michelangelo's protestations of the chastity of his behaviour, Tommaso's high social position and the relatively public nature of their relationship make it improbable that it was not platonic."
  91. ^ a b c Hughes, Anthony: "Michelangelo", p. 326. Phaidon, 1997. The author insists Michelangelo's homoerotic poems form, "an emotionless and elegant re-imagining of Platonic dialogue, whereby erotic poetry was seen as an expression of refined sensibilities".
  92. ^ Rictor Norton, "The Myth of the Modern Homosexual", p. 143. Cassell, 1997.
  93. .
  94. , p. 29.
  95. ^ Salmi, Mario; Becherucci, Luisa; Marabottini, Alessandro; Tempesti, Anna Forlani; Marchini, Giuseppe; Becatti, Giovanni; Castagnoli, Ferdinando; Golzio, Vincenzo (1969). The Complete Work of Raphael. New York: Reynal and Co., William Morrow and Company. pp. 587, 610.
  96. ^ Bartz and König, p. 8
  97. ^ Bartz and König, p. 22
  98. ^ a b Goldscheider, p. 9
  99. ^ Hirst and Dunkerton, pp. 20–21
  100. ^ Bartz and König, pp. 26–27
  101. ^ Bartz and König, pp. 62–63
  102. ^ Coughlan, pp. 166–67
  103. ^ Goldscieder p. 12
  104. ^ a b c d e Paoletti and Radke, pp. 402–03
  105. ^ Vasari, et al.
  106. ^ Bartz and König
  107. ^ Coughlan
  108. ^ J. de Tolnay, The Youth of Michelangelo, p. 18
  109. ^ Goldscheider, p. 8
  110. ^ a b Giorgio Vasari, Lives of the Artists: Michelangelo
  111. ^ J. de Tolnay, The Youth of Michelangelo, p. 135
  112. ^ Goldscheider
  113. ^ Nikolaus Pevsner, An Outline of European Architecture, Pelican, 1964
  114. ^ a b Gardner
  115. .
  116. .
  117. .
  118. .
  119. ^ "Michelangelo". Oxford Reference. 22 February 1999. Retrieved 17 February 2023.
  120. ^ Coughlan, p. 179
  121. ^ a b Grossoni, Donata (12 October 2017). "Michelangelo's tomb: five fun facts you probably didn't know". The Florentine. Retrieved 20 May 2021.
  122. .
  123. .
  124. .
  125. ^ Ken Tucker (15 March 1991). "A Season of Giants (1991)". Entertainment Weekly. Archived from the original on 14 July 2014. Retrieved 11 July 2014.
  126. ^ Hal Erickson (2014). "A Season of Giants (1991)". Movies & TV Dept. The New York Times. Archived from the original on 16 July 2014. Retrieved 11 July 2014.
  127. .
  128. ^ "Michelangelo – Endless". filmitalia.org. Retrieved 29 November 2019.
  129. ^ "Il Peccato, 2019" (in Russian). kinopoisk.ru. Retrieved 29 November 2019.

Sources

Further reading

External links