Elements of Art

FORM

1Presentation by J. Sikes, 2007

Illustrated by the Works of

Michelangelo

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Michelangelo was an artist during the

"However rich I may have been, I have always lived like a poor man."

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Italian sculptor, architect, painter, and

poet

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Michelangelo’s Life

• Born March 6, 1475 in Caprese, Italy

• Mother died when he was six

• Grew up without affection

• Father wanted him to be a merchant

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“When I told my father that I wish to be an artist, he flew into a rage, --- “artists are laborers,

no better than shoemakers."

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Michelangelo’s Youth

• Apprenticed at age 12 to painter in Florence

• Lived with ruling Medici family in their palace

• Started working as a sculptor under Donatello

• Sculpted Bacchus

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Michelangelo wanted to learn about anatomy by studying

corpses. This was forbidden by the Catholic Church. He made an agreement with the Church that

he could study cadavers in return for a carved wooden crucifix. Studying bodies made him ill

many times.

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Michelangelo was a master painter but his true

passion was sculpting.

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For Michelangelo, the job of the sculptor was to free the forms that

were already inside the stone.

He believed that every stone had a sculpture within it, and that the work of sculpting was simply a matter of chipping away all that

was not a part of the statue.

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Michelangelo’s PietaA marble

sculpture in St. Peter’s Basilica in

Vatican City, Rome, Italy.

It was the first of

a number of works of the same

theme by Michelangelo.

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Pieta’Saint

Peter's Basilica,

Rome, Italy

Note the lines in the sculpture. 12

He was commissioned to portray David as a symbol of

Florentine freedom.

Michelangelo responded by completing his most famous

work, David in 1504.

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Michelangelo’s David

David, sculpted from 1501 to 1504, is a

masterpiece of Renaissance sculpture

and one of Michelangelo's two greatest works of

sculpture

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David 15

Original LocationThe original “David” now stands in an art gallery in Florence,

Italy. This is a copy standing in the original location of the David, in front of

the Palazzo Vecchio, Florence.

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Michelangelo did not want to paint. He preferred sculpture.

Pope Julius II insisted he paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

It became Michelangelo’s greatest work. There he painted scenes from the Old Testament.

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Sistine ChapelHis Sistine Chapel The composition eventually contained over 300 figures and had at its center nine episodes from the Book of Genesis, divided into three groups:- God's

Creation of the Earth, God's Creation of Humankind and their fall from God's grace, and lastly, the state of

Humanity as represented by Noah and his family. On the pendentives supporting the ceiling are painted twelve men and women who prophesied the coming of the Jesus. They

are seven prophets of Israel and five Sibyls, prophetic women of the Classical world.

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Doors of the Sistine Chapel

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The Sistine Chapel is part of the official residence of the Pope in Vatican City, Rome, Italy. The architecture is supposed to be similar to that of Solomon’s Temple.

The Sistine Chapel

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Fresco

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A fresco is a painting done on wet plaster

The Banishing of Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden

PendentiveA pendentive is a constructive device permitting the placing of a circular dome over a square room or an elliptical dome over a rectangular room.

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The Ceiling of the Sistine

Chapel

Note: 10 of the twelve pendentives 9 scenes from Genesis.

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God creates the Sun and Moon

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The Face of God

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God and Adam

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Hands of God and Adam

Adam

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God Creates

Eve

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David and Goliath29

Jeremiah

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Jonah

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Joel

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Isaiah

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Pope Julius II commissioned him to build a magnificent tomb.

Michelangelo worked on it for years, but did not finish the 40 statues

ordered.

Michelangelo had to constantly stop work on the tomb in order to accomplish numerous other tasks. Because of these

interruptions, Michelangelo worked on the tomb for 40 years. The tomb, of which the central feature is

Michelangelo's statue of Moses, was never finished to Michelangelo's satisfaction

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Moses, the centerpiece of Pope Julius II’s tomb

When finishing the Moses in Rome,

Michelangelo violently hit the knee of the

statue with a hammer, shouting, "Why don't

you speak to me?"

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Michelangelo was commissioned to make the tombs for the

Medici family.

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Statues of the Medici brothers

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Pope Paul VII Farnese asked him to paint a fresco of the Last

Judgment above the alter of the Sistine Chapel. It would be the largest painting in the world at

that time.

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Above the Alter of the Sistine Chapel

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The Last Judgment

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The work is massive and spans the entire wall behind the altar of the Sistine Chapel. The Last Judgment is

a depiction of the second coming of

Christ and the apocalypse; where the souls of humanity rise

and are assigned to their various fates, as

judged by Christ, surrounded by the

Saints.

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Michaelangelo’s Architectural Contributions

•Dome at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome

•The Pilaster

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Dome of Saint Peter’s Basilica at the Vatican in Rome

Michelangelo was named the chief architect for St. Peter’s Basilica and drew the design for its dome.

However he died before it was completed.

Michelangelo’s design

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A pilaster is a slightly-projecting column built into or onto a wall. A pilaster is a flattened or abbreviated

column that is in "low-relief” or flat against the wall. The pilaster is

an architectural element of classical architecture and is used to give the appearance of a supporting

column, with only an ornamental function.

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Giant Order of Pilasters

Louvre (eastern facade) Museum in Paris

In Classical architecture, a giant order is an order whose columns or pilaster span two (or more) stories

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Michelangelo’s last years were spent chiseling a last pieta. He wrote his best poetry near the

end of his life. He was buried in Florence, Italy.

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Michelangelo died and his body was put in a sarcophagus in

Rome. His nephew sneaked his body out of Rome and buried it in Florence where he wanted to

be buried.

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Michelangelo's own tomb, at

Basilica di Santa, Florence , Italy

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REVIEWTwo of Michelangelo’s best-known works, the Pieta and the David, were sculpted before he turned thirty. Despite his low opinion of painting, Michelangelo also created two of the most influential

works in fresco in the history of Western art: the Scenes from Genesis on the ceiling and The Last Judgment on

the altar wall of the Sistine Chapel in Rome. Later in life he designed the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica in the same city and

revolutionized classical architecture with his invention of the giant order of pilasters

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