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Example research essay topic: Michelangelo And Sistine Chapel - 1,998 words

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Michelangelo and Sistine Chapel One of the greatest creators in the history of art Michelangelo (1475 - 1564) has left a vivid mark in the history. Until today many people are amazed by his works, out of which the painting on the wall and the ceiling of Sistine Chapel remains the most popular and admired. The scholars have found that all of Michelangelo's work was based on his life from childhood up to six days before his death. In this essay I will analyse the life of Michelangelo and the affect it had on his art.

Michelangelo Buonarroti was born on March 6, 1475 in the village of Caprese, Italy, where his father was serving as a magistrate of the Florentine Republic. Michelangelo briefly attended grammar school managed by Francesco da Urbino but he spent most of his time drawing or sketching (Jugas, 35). At thirteen Michelangelo was apprenticed to Dominica Ghirlanaio, the leading fresco (wall) painter in Florence. Michelangelo remained only one year: it was Ghirlandaio himself who sent him to the Medici Gardens Art School that Lorenzo the magnificent had founded in Florence for young artists and sculptures. During this first year at the Medici Gardens, the young Buonarroti developed his innate quality by studying the ancient masterpieces, sketching, drawing and fashioning clay models after the works of Donatello and Masaccio (Jugas, 43).

It is believed that during this period he carved two bas-reliefs: one depicting the Battle of Centaurs a subject taken from Greek mythology in the style of the Old Masters the second one Madonna on the Stairs is a flattened relief derived from Donatello. The Madonna of the steps is one of his earliest sculptures in which the author tackles a subject to which he would return several times: the Virgin Mary and the Christ Child, with the mother already touched by a foreboding that her son is destined to suffer and die for others. Although a little uncertain in places, the work is a remarkable feat for a youth of 15 or 16. The first signs of Michelangelo's future popularity were becoming visible after his early works. Michelangelo's reputation grew quickly and the banker Jacopo Galli who commissioned him to carve The Backup then called him to Rome (Jugas, 44). The early masterpieces of Michelangelo were considered such a great achievement that the cardinal of St.

Denis immediately asked Michelangelo to sculpture a Pieta for one of the chapels in St. Peters. A Pieta is a representation of the crucified Christ, laid out in the lap of his sorrowing mother. During the 15 th century the subject was common in France and Germany but little-known in Italy; and Michelangelo's great sculpture was in fact commissioned by a French cardinal-diplomat, Jean Bilhires de Lagraulas, for his tomb in old St.

Peters Rome. Michelangelo almost intended the work to make him famous (which it did), carving the drapery in elaborate detail and giving the surfaces a high polish such as he never felt to be necessary in later works. The problem of making the group look realistic was triumphantly solved by impossibly wide and voluminous, and if she stood up she would be well over 2 meters (166 feet) tall. Michelangelo's Mary is as young as her son. In the manner of the High Renaissance, both figures are physically beautiful and the atmosphere is one of nobility and restrained emotion.

It is still one of the most breathtaking sights in St. Peters. While completing the Pieta Michelangelo's friends in Florence asked him to come back home; they informed him that there was a huge block of Carrara marble lying in the warehouse off the Cathedral Church. Some other artist, who felt he could not continue with it because the piece of marble was found with a large hole in the centre and flaws everywhere, had already injured the marble block years before. Michelangelo immediately started working on a wax figure from which the large statue of David holding a sling in his left hand was to evolve. The actual carving started in August 1501 with Michelangelo working on it constantly everyday and sometimes into the night until January 1504 when he completed the statue.

David is a colossus that represents the biblical boy hero who slew the Philistine champion Goliath. In creating a figure the expressed not only heroism but ideal beauty and inner tension, Michelangelo was acknowledged to have surpassed the ancient Greek and Roman models so admired by the Renaissance. In September 1504 the statue was brought into the main city square and installed in the place of honour in front of the seat of government. During the happy period (1501 - 1505) that Michelangelo spent in Florence, in addition to the statue of David, he also received a series of private commissions and he produced two sculptured relics called Tondo Pieta and Tondo Taddei - the Holy family also known as the Done Tondo.

A Tondo is a circular painting or sculpture; this one is linked with Michelangelo's merchant friend Angelo Done who was a perceptive patron and art collector. It was probably painted to celebrate Doni's wedding to Maddalena Stozzi in late 1503 or early 1504; an elaborate frame round the picture carries the arms of the Strozzi family. During this period, when Michelangelo worked on many projects, he was already thinking about something big, something that would belong to the humanity (and not to the private collections), and would make the author to be remembered by the future generations. This piece of art that Michelangelo thought about is now known as The Sistine Chapel.

The Encyclopaedia of America says this chapel was built by Giovanni de Dolci between 1471 and 1484 for Sixtus IV. Even though The Sistine Chapel is considered my many to be just a piece of art, it is a well-known landmark because of its beauty, history, and the significance of the Sistine Chapel. The Sistine Chapel is located in Vatican, which is home to many historic landmarks, and museums. Vatican is also the home of the Pope and is a well know historic catholic city. According to the World Book Encyclopaedia 1999 vol 18 The Sistine Chapel is a simple building, 134 ft long by 44 ft wide and 85 ft tall. But it has on its ceilings and walls some of the greatest art ever produced.

Brilliant artists of the late 1400 s decorated the walls with paintings that tell the stories of Moses and Christ (World Book 476 Vol 17). On the ceiling are Biblical stories painted by the great artist Michelangelo between 1508 and 1512. According to Charles Store the author of the book Michelangelo the Sistine ceiling the ceiling tells the history of the creation of the world, the fall of humanity, and the flood. On the Wall above the altar is probably the most famous painting in the chapel and it is called the last judgment, a painting over 50 ft tall and 30 ft wide.

Michelangelo worked on the last judgment for an entire 5 years. According to Michael Hirst the author of The Sistine Chapel - A glorious Restoration This chapel was also decorated by many of the great artists of the time which include Sandro Botticelli, Luck Signorelli, and Perugino. All of these walls, which were decorated by these men, show the history of the World according to the Bible. This wonderful, amazing piece of work took sixty-eight years to accomplish; from the ground breaking until the final touches were placed on the extraordinary art work. This Terrific piece of art still to this day is inspiring artists of out time. Not only is the chapel beautiful but it also has enormous amounts of historical value.

This chapel is where the chief papal ceremonies take place. The chapel is also where the Cardinals come to elect a new Pope (World Book 476 Vol 17). The chapel is a rectangular brick structure with six round arched windows on each of the long walls and a low barrel-vaulted ceiling. Though this is a beautiful structure, the chapel is most well known for it's ceiling paintings. This ceiling appears to be a rare original piece, before the painting on the ceiling of the Sistine chapel nothing like this had ever been done. Though the walls are beautiful the art accomplished by Michelangelo has proven over time to be and extraordinary, beautiful piece of work.

According to The World Book Encyclopaedia 1999 Vol 13 pg 484 Michelangelo's contribution to the chapel was the grandest of them all. Michelangelo, forced against his own will by Julius to undertake the huge task, began the ceiling in 1508 and completed it in 1512. Michelangelo while painting the ceiling used a technique call today fresco, this is the applying of paint to damp, freshly laid plaster and working quickly before the plaster sets and dries. Michelangelo painted the ceiling from a scaffold, standing up, not lying down on his back as many historians once thought (World Book 1999 Vol 13 pg 484).

While Michelangelo painted the ceiling he also kept a journal, and in this journal he wrote a poem in which he complained of a stiff neck and of paint dripping into his eyes. In the margin on the same page he drew a caricature of himself reaching up to paint. The top of this ceiling is about seventy feet from the floor. The work of Michelangelo was tremendous but it lasted very long through the time without any necessity to be maintained or renewed. However, when in the beginning of the twentieth century the nations of the world turned their eyes at the historical heritage of the world, they noticed that many of the masterpieces that were expected to be eternal need attention as soon as possible. This was the case of Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel.

The first restoration of the paintings began after World War One in 1919. However due to the lack of funds and limited technological resources the project was not completed. Soon the World War Two began. Invaded by the fascist Germany Vatican could not decently protect its cultural artefacts and people forgot about the Sistine Chapel. However, Germans were wise enough not to destroy the monument as they did with many of them around Europe.

After the war it took a long time for artists, scientists, and interested people to get back to the issue of the Sistine Chapel restoration. Undertaken in 1980 s controversial restoration employed several hundreds of restoration professionals, utilized sophisticated machinery and advanced computer technology (Restoring a Legacy). As the result, the previously unknown brilliance of Michelangelo's colours and gradations was discovered and revealed. The restoration took twice as long as it initially took the painters to create the decorations initially back in the sixteenth century. The situation was worsened by the fact that millions of the candles that have burned in the Chapel have done virtually unrecoverable damage to the paintings. One of the biggest challenges for the high technology part of the restoration team was to configure the computer system.

The components for the machinery arrived from different parts of the world and were controlled by the software written in numerous programming languages including Fortran, C, SQL, Unix, and several others. Therefore, just the process of configuring and updating the settings for the equipment took the team couple of years (Restoring a Legacy). The united effort of great number of people taking part in the restoration, which oftentimes turned out into the reconstruction, of the Chapel allows the people today to observe and become astonished by the beauty of the Sistine Chapel. Now the Chapels ventilation is upgraded and uses the equipment, which configured to clean the microclimate within the chapel on the daily basis. The overall cost of the project has exceeded six million dollars. Bibliography: Jugas, Joseph.

The Greatest Artists Lives. Dublin: Dublin Publishers, 1987. World Book Encyclopaedia. Sistine Chapel. 1999. Restoring a Legacy.

January 24, 2004. Found Online at: web


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