Portrait: The sculptor, painter, architect and poet Michelangelo

Wednesday, 28 August 2019 - 11:00 am (CET/MEZ) Berlin | Author/Destination:
Category/Kategorie: Architecture, Portrait
Reading Time:  3 minutes

Michelangelo by Daniele da Volterra © Metropolitan Museum of Art - online collection

Michelangelo by Daniele da Volterra © Metropolitan Museum of Art – online collection

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni or more commonly known by his first name Michelangelo was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect and poet of the High Renaissance born in the Republic of Florence, who exerted an unparalleled influence on the development of Western art. Considered by many the greatest artist of his lifetime, and by some the greatest artist of all time, his artistic versatility was of such a high order that he is often considered a contender for the title of the archetypal Renaissance man, along with his rival, the fellow Florentine and client of the Medici, Leonardo da Vinci.

A number of Michelangelo’s works of painting, sculpture and architecture rank among the most famous in existence. His output in these fields was prodigious; given the sheer volume of surviving correspondence, sketches and reminiscences, he is the best-documented artist of the 16th century. He sculpted two of his best-known works, the Pietà and David, before the age of thirty. Despite holding a low opinion of painting, he also 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. At the age of 74, he succeeded Antonio da Sangallo the Younger as the architect of St. Peter’s Basilica. He transformed the plan so that the western end was finished to his design, as was the dome, with some modification, after his death.

Sistine Capel - The Last Judgement by Michelangelo © Alonso de Mendoza Sistine Capel ceiling by Michelangelo © Qypchak/cc-by-sa-3.0 Michelangelo's Pieta in St Peter's Basilica © Stanislav Traykov/cc-by-2.5 Statue of David by Michelangelo in Florence © Jörg Bittner Unna/cc-by-3.0 Michelangelos tombin the Basilica of Santa Croce in Florence © Wknight94 - Jaakobou/cc-by-sa-3.0 Michelangelo by Daniele da Volterra © Metropolitan Museum of Art - online collection
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Michelangelos tombin the Basilica of Santa Croce in Florence © Wknight94 - Jaakobou/cc-by-sa-3.0
Michelangelo was the first Western artist whose biography was published while he was alive. In fact, two 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”.

In his lifetime, Michelangelo was often called Il Divino (“the divine one”). His contemporaries often admired his terribilità—his ability to instil a sense of awe. Attempts by subsequent artists to imitate Michelangelo’s impassioned, highly personal style resulted in Mannerism, the next major movement in Western art after the High Renaissance.

Read more on Wikipedia Michelangelo (Smart Traveler App by U.S. Department of State - Weather report by weather.com - Global Passport Power Rank - Travel Risk Map - Democracy Index - GDP according to IMF, UN, and World Bank - Global Competitiveness Report - Corruption Perceptions Index - Press Freedom Index - World Justice Project - Rule of Law Index - UN Human Development Index - Global Peace Index - Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Index). Photos by Wikimedia Commons. If you have a suggestion, critique, review or comment to this blog entry, we are looking forward to receive your e-mail at comment@wingsch.net. Please name the headline of the blog post to which your e-mail refers to in the subject line.






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