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Revision as of 23:58, 29 January 2002 by Mav (talk | contribs) (took out weird extra spaces between paragraphs)(diff) ← Previous revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475 - 1564), Renaissance painter, sculptor, and architect.
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Under the patronage of Pope Julius II Michelangelo created the monumental ceiling paintings on the Vatican's Sistine Chapel (Cappella Sistina) ceiling between 1508 and 1512. His painting of the Last Judgment (Giudizio Universale) on the altar wall of the same chapel was commissioned by Pope Paul III almost 20 years later (1534-1541). When the work was finished (October 1541), Michelangelo was accused of untolerable obscenity for his naked figures that, even if representing saints, still were naked figures showing their genitals (and inside a church, and a particularly important one). A violent censorship campaign was then immediately organised by Cardinal Carafa and Monsignor Sernini (Mantua's ambassador) to remove the frescoes, but the Pope obviously resisted. In coincidence with Michelangelo's death, an intermediate point was achieved and a law was issued to cover genitals ("Pictura in Cappella Ap.ca coopriantur"). So Daniele da Volterra, an apprentice of Michelangelo, covered with sort of perizomas part of the scandal, at least most evident details, leaving unaltered the complex of bodies (see details , , ). When the work was restored in 1993, the restorers chose not to remove the perizomas of Daniele; however, a faithful copy of the original (uncensored) Giudizio, by Marcello Venusti, is now in Naples, at Capodimonte Museum.
Censorship always followed Michelangelo, once described as "inventor delle porcherie" (inventor of obscenities, in a sense that in italian sounds like as if he had also created the form of... indecent organs). This might also be the origin of the legend that Michelangelo was homosexual.
The "fig-leaf campaign" of Controriforma to cover all representations of human genitals in paintings and sculptures started with Michelangelo's works. Just to make two examples, the bronze statue of "Cristo della Minerva" was covered, as it is today, and the statue of a naked child Jesus in "Madonna di Bruges" (Belgium) remained covered for several decades (source: De Maio, Michelangelo e la controriforma - Torino-Bari, 1974).
He created the frescoes "The Martyrdom of St. Peter" and "The Conversion of St. Paul" in the Vatican's Capella Paolina, as well as countless sculptures including those of Madonna (many), Bacchus, Pieta, David, Moses, Rachel, Leah, and members of the Medici family.
Several anecdotes reveal that Michelangelo's skill was deeply appreciated, especially in scuplture. It is said that when still a young apprentist, he had made a neoclassical statue (Il Putto dormiente, the sleeping child) of such beaty and perfection, that he made it in Florence and it was later on sold in Rome as an ancient Roman original. Another better-known anecdote claims that when finishing the Moses (Rome, San Pietro in Vincoli), Michelangelo violently hit the knee of the statue with a hammer, shouting: "why don't you speak to me?".
In the 1970s, the enchanting Pietà, in St. Peter's first chapel at right, was assaulted by a mentally diseased man, who seriously damaged it in many parts with a hammer.