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MICHELANGELO
ND THE
STONECUTTERS
NormanE.
Land
As
a
sculptor
and
an architect,
Michelangelo
(1475-1564)
used stone;and because
e
usedstone,
he
often
employedscarpellini
(stonecarvers
r
stonecutters)uch as,
or
example,
PieroBasso,Bartolommeo i Chi-
menti,and GiovanniNanni della Grassa,o
all of whom
he
refers
n his letters.r
Unsur-
prisingly,
n
his Lives
of
theArtists, n
both
the irst edition of 1550and he second di-
t ion of
1568,
Giorgio
Vasari
1511-1574)
tells stories bout
Michelangelo nd
various
stonecutters.
he
same
s true
of the sculptor
Ascanio
Condivi
1525-1
14)
n his Life of
Michelangelo
Buonarrori, irst
published
n
Rome
n
1553.
Vasari
and Condivi are
not
the only sixteenth-century uthors o recount
talesabout
Michelangelo
and
stonecutters.
Florentine writer
and
publisher
Anton
Francesco oni
(
15
3-1574)
ells wo
such
tales,one of
which
has
been argely
over-
looked.
According
o Condivi, stonecutters
haped
Michelangelo's
ersonality
ven n his in-
fancy.After his father,Lodovico, had
served
as
podestd
of the village of
Caprese,
where
his sonwas
born,
he
returned o Florence o
live
on
a
family
farm at Settignano,
village
body and diverted
him from
his
natural
n-
clination.Although Condivi
is
not clear on
the
point, Michelangeloseems o
have be-
lieved that he had
been
destined
or
a
life
appropriate
o his
noble origins,
but
his wet
nurse's
elationship o stonesand stone-
cutters
omehownfluenced
er milk. which
changed im
into
a sculptor.2
uchan opin-
ion would have been in keeping with
Lodovico's
nterestn his son's
place
n
life.
According o Condivi,
Michelangelo's
ocial
statuswas of
great
oncern o his father.
Impressed y the
young
artist'sability in
imitating
he
marbleheadof a
faun,
Condivi
continues,
Lorenzo
il
Magnifico de'
Medici (1449-1492)wants he boy to live
in the Medici
palace
and work in
his
sculp-
ture
garden.
Accordingly,
he
asks to
see
Michelangelo's
ather,who does
not
want
his
son to become
a stonecutter
scar-
pellino ),
even
afterhis son's
riend
and
el -
low
artist
FrancescoGranacci
1469-1543)
explains o
him
the
significantdifferences
betweena sculptorand
a stonecutter. ev-
ertheless,
n his
conversation
ith Lorenzo
de' Medici, Lodovico
grantspermission
or
Michelangelo
o
live in
the Medici
house-
SOURCE: Notes in the History of Art, 33, 1 (2013)© Norman E. Land
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talented
sculptors
and treats
Michelangelo
as f
he werea son.
Michelangelo's
mpecu-
nious but noble father is concernedabout
his
reputationand does
not want
his
son
o
become
an artisan,a
merestonecutter.3
In the second
edition
of the Lives,
Vasari
repeatsCondivi's
accountof
Michelangelo
and
his
wet nursebut with some
significant
differences.
Vasari says that the
farm near
Settignanowas full of stonesand attracted
stonecutters
ndartists,
manyof
whom were
born
in the area.
Vasari
also explains
hat
later n
his
life Michelangelomodestly
e-
marked
n
jest,
Giorgio,
f
I
haveanything
of the
good
in my brain,
t has
come from
my beingborn
n the
pure
air of
your
country
of
Arezzo,even
as also
sucked
n
with my
nurse's
milk the chiselsand hammerwith
which I
makemy figures. a
f
Vasari s to be
believed,
Michelangelo,
he
supreme rtist,
in
spite
of his noble ancestry,
elt
a
kind of
fundamental ondwith stonecutters.
ichel-
angelo
and stonecutters
re
both
manual
a-
borers.
Even though, as
workers
n stone,
they are not equally talented,he and they
use he
samekinds of tools- chisels
and
hammef -tO
Carve
StOne.
In the
irst andsecond ditionsof
the
Lives,
Vasari
ells
another
very
different
kind of
story about
Michelangelo
nd
a stonecutter,
one hat Condivi
gnores.As
he
is
finishing
the tomb of
Pope
Julius
I
in San
Pietro
n
Vincoli,
Michelangelo, ow a
mature
sculp-
tor,
asksan unidentified
stonecuttero
make
a terminal igure
for
it
and
nstructs
him in
how to
proceed.
Cut
away
here, he says,
Why?
asks
Michelangelo.
Because,
hanks
o
you,
've discovered
a talent neverknewI had. s
There
s
ambiguity
here.
The story might
gently
mock
the
stonecutter
or
believing
that
he is more
than
a stonecutter-that
Michelangelo
has brought
forth
his innate
talent
for sculpture-when
in fact he
has
merely
ollowed
he artist's
nstructions.
On
the otherhand, he stonecutterelieveshat
Michelangelo
has
revealed he
sculptor
n
him
to him.
In either case,
he story
is related o
Mi-
chelangelo's
elief hat
he sculptor's
ask
s
to
removebits
of
stone
rom
a
block
in order
to
discover
he
igure nside.
n a sonnet
writ-
ten around
1538-1544,he
amously ays:
Noteven
hebest
f artists
asanyconcep-
tion
That
a single
marble lock
does otcontain
Within
ts excess, nd
hat s only
attained
By the
hand hat
obeys
he
ntellect.6
In Vasari's
tory,
Michelangelo
s
the
intel-
lect, and he stonecutters the hand. The
stonecutter
beys
Michelangelo's
ntellect
rather han
his own
but nevertheless
akes
a
worthy
figure.
Michelangelo,known
for
uncovering
he
igure
within a
marble
block,
instructs
he stonecutter
n how to
discover
the igure
n his stone.T
In his I Marmi
(Venice:
1552),
Doni has
one of
the nterlocutors, turnernamedCer-
rota,
epeat
almost
verbatim
Vasari's ale of
the stonecutter
who assisted
Michelangelo
in
completing
he omb
of Julius I.
Because
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l8
of Julius
II seemcrudely executed
when
compared o Michelangelo's
powerful
fig-
uresbelow.
In
the
secondedition of
his Lives, Vasari
also tells a tale about
another stonecutter
and
riend namedDomenicoFancelli
born
1465)
and
called
Topolino,
or the
Little
Mouse.
Vasari observes hat although
Topolino,
who was a simple ellow, believed
himself to be a capable
artist, he
was
in
truth very
feeble
as
a sculptor.He worked
for many
years
in
the
quarries
of
Carrara,
cutting
marble that
he
would send to
Michelangelo. mong the
marble
blocks
he
dispatched o
his friend, Topolino would
sometimesncludeseveral arved
igures
of
his own
making. When Michelangelosaw
Topolino's sculptures,
e would laugh out
loud.
Once,Topolinoattemptedo carvea
figure
of Mercury and,
when t was
almost
inished,
called
Michelangelo
o see
t. Michelangelo,
who foundTopolino'ssimplicity
idiculous,
told
his friend hat he was
a
madman o try
to make figures and
pointed
out that the
dwarfish
and misshapen
Mercury
was a
third of a
braccio short between he knees
and
he eet.
Undaunted,
opolinosaid hat
he would
put
his
sculpture
ight
and,cutting
the figure below the knees, added a new
length of marble, which made the
propor-
tions
correct. He also carved a
pair
of
buskins or his figure, he opsof which cov-
might have
ruined it. Michelangelo brings
out the best
in Topolino.
In
a
published let ter from Padua dated
February IJ,
1544, to the
poet
Bernardino
Daniello
da
Lucca,
Doni relates a
*mezza
novella
(short
story) that
is
similar
in struc-
ture to Vasari's story
about
Topolino. This
time the stonecutter
s
an old
man who has
a high opinion of
his own talent,
and he has
carved a single,
ridiculous
figure
of Jupiter.
As fate
would have t. an old stonecutter
from Fiesole-a
man who in his entire
ife
had made one small
marble igure a
half
a
braccio
high-in his old agesaw
a miracle.
This miracle was
the one Michelangelo
Buonarroti
made with
great perfection
n
his
youth,
that Giant
[that
is, the David]
standing
n the
prazzan Florence. he
good
man, having heard about
he work and that
it wasmadeby a
youth,went o Florence o
see t. There,dazzled ndstupefied,
e went
to
find him
[Michelangelo]
o
tell him that
his work
was
admirable
and ook much
oy
in
doing so.
Then he said:
I
have made a
small figure that
I know will not displease
you,
so much so
hat f it will not be bother-
some, will bring
it here o show
you.
And
returning
[to
Florence] another day,
he
brought a Jupite4 a
thing baptized n his
[Jupiter's]
style,
[at
least] n so far as this
figure, or dummy
lfantoccio],
was nude.
And, sincehe
hadmade t with oneshoulder
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t9
andwith much
diligence ompletedhe ask,
working the figure with graceso that the
[new
piece
ofl
marblehardly
seemed dded.
Returning
o Michelangelohe said:
My
son, have epaired t,
as
you
see. Certainly,
the correctedwork was
pleasing,
ut there
was
somethingelse to address, he legs,
which
were somewhat large,
and
he
[Michelangelo]said to him: I must warn
you,
my father, hat in carving the figure
you
must take
care
not
to
go
in too much
[that
s, do not takeaway oo much marble],
because
ou
hardly
could add marble here
[in
the egs] as
[you
havel
o the shoulder.
The stonecutter
oon
eturned
nother ime.
and he had made the figure's legs so thin
that
t
could hardly standon its feet.
This,
my father,
you
can hardly remedy,
said
Michelangelo. nd, having
carefullyexam-
ined
his figure, he old man
said
n
departing,
I
will do something
o it. And returning
o
his house, e
took awayso much hat he
cut
the egsof his ittle figure nto two pieces f
drilled marble,
and
he
madea
pair
of boots
on the egsworked with
grace.
And he car-
ried
the
figure
to Florenceagain
to show,
believing hat he had
a Colossusor a La-
ocodn.Imagine ow
beautifula sight
a
nude
figure wearing
boots could
be.
When
Michelangelosaw the figure, he began o
laugh
and said o the old stonecutter:
Now,
my father,
you
have ndeed
done
some-
thing':
you
havemade
a
pair
of boots or
a
Part
of the
humor of this tale lies in the
transformationof the figure of Jupiter that
is
appropriately
nude into one
that
wears
boots.The inept old stonecutter,n his at-
tempts o
respond o Michelangelo's
criti-
cisms,
does
something ;
e
ruins
his figure.
He is
ust
the oppositeof the stonecutter
n
the tale told by both
Vasari
and Doni. That
man, again following Michelangelo's n-
structions, reates
worthy figure
and
n
so
doingbelieves
e
discovers talent
he never
knew he had.
Doni's
novella
may
be
pure
fiction,
or
it
may be a historically accurate epresentation
of an event
n Michelangelo's ife. A
third
possibility s that the story s a mixture of
fact
and
iction. In any
case, he tale,
which
appearedn
abouta
quarter
of
a century
before Vasari
published
his account of
Topolino, s
structurally imilar o the
atter.
Each
stonecutter
epresents
n ancient
god,
Mercury
and Jupiter,
espectively.
ach
al -
ters the appearanceof his figure after
Michelangelo riticizes t, adding
pieces
of
marble
o
his
sculpture.
Both
storiesare, n
turn,
alsosimilar o the ale of the stonecutter
whom Michelangelo
guides
n
the carving
of a
figure. His figure, however,
unlike the
others,
s not ridiculous
and even appears
on oneof Michelangelo'smajorworks.Per-
hapsmost significantly,Doni's
tale,
ike
the
others
presented
ere, eflectMichelangelo's
involvementwith
stonecuttersndhis affin-
8/17/2019 Michelangelo and the Stone Cutters
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20
(University
Park:
Pennsylvania
tate
UniversityPress,
1999),pp.6-7. William E. Wallace, Michelangelo's
Wet Nurse, Arion 17, no. 2
(Fall
2OO9):54, otices
the discrepancy etween
Michelangelo's oble
birth
and
his lowly
profession.
See also
Paul
Barolsky,
Giotto's
Father and the
Farnily
of Vasari's
Lives
(University
Park:
Pennsylvania
tate
UniversityPress,
1992),
pp.74-75.
3.
Condivi .
p.
10-13.
4. Giorgio Vasari,Live.s f the Painters,Sculptors,
and Architecl.r, rans.Gastondu C. de
Vere.
2
vols.
(NewYork:
Knopf,1996).II,
p.
643.
5.
Ibid., II, p.
7
46 .
6.
MichelangeloBuonarroti ThePoetry
of Michel-
angelo,
rans.
James
M. Saslow
(New
Haven:
Yale
University
Press,
99l),
p.302.
sonnet
-51.
Seealso
ibid.,p.305, sonnet152: by taking away, . . . ] one
puts
into hard
and alpine
stone a figure hat' salive
/ and that
grows
arger
wherever he stonedecreases
t l
7. Anton Francesco oni.
I
Marni. ed.
PietroFan-
fani ,2 vols.
Florence:
863), ,
p.129.
8.
Vasari,
I, pp.
745-146.
9. Original text
in Anton
FrancescoDoni,
Lettere
(Venice:GirolamoScotto,1544),letter I. I haveused
the
text in id., Novelle, ed. Giuseppe
Petragl ione
(Bergamo:
stituto
taliano
d'Arti
Grafiche.
1907), p.
17-18.
I
am
grateful to Carol Lazzaro-Weiss,who
kindly corrected he first
drafi
of
my
translation.
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