11 May 2024: Michelangelo: The Last Decades
A Man of Many Parts
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni (6 March 1475 – 18 February 1564)
Michelangelo (wikipedia)
I’m so glad we were able to see this beautiful exhibition.
Michelangelo worked in several art forms. I knew about his sculptures (David and Pietà) and painting (Sistine Chapel Ceiling and The Last Judgement).
I learned from this exhibition that later in life he also turned to architecture (he played a key role in the design of St. Peter’s Basilica) and wrote poetry on art, love, and spirituality (the exhibition includes some manuscripts).
He also did many drawings, especially sketches for his larger works.
The exhibition also includes works by other artists that Michelangelo knew or worked with (he provided them with sketches).
The review in The Guardian is worth a look to get a feel for the exhibition.
Michelangelo - The Last Decades (Guardian Review)
This huge yet intimate show of the Renaissance polymath’s work guides you by the heart as well as the eyes, through hypnotic studies, his own words, and drawings that are prayers as much as pictures
In this post I’ve included images of things that caught my eye as I moved through the space.
Most of the text is taken from the wall texts of the exhibition and the website. These texts tell a compelling story.
The British Museum website provides a lot of interesting material (text and photos).
Michelangelo - The Last Decades
In 1534, Michelangelo left Florence for Rome, never to see his native city again. He was 59, which many contemporaries regarded as old, but for Michelangelo this move marked the beginning of a dramatic new chapter which would fundamentally shape his experiences as an artist and as a man.
In 1534, Michelangelo Buonarroti was 59 years old and already the most celebrated artist in Europe.
Michelangelo - Conserving Michelangelo’s ‘Epifania’
Ahead of our major new exhibition, Michelangelo: the last decades, conservators Caroline Barry and Emma Turner reveal how they got a rare Michelangelo masterpiece ready to take centre stage.
Daniele da Volterra (1509-1566): Portrait of Michelangelo
This is the first thing you see as you enter the exhibition.
Michelangelo’s achievements as sculptor and painter - including his David (1501-4) and Sistine Chapel ceiling frescoes (1508-12) - made him the most celebrated artist in Europe.
This affectionate drawing of him in his seventies, by his friend Daniele da Volterra, is a study for the Assumption of the Virgin. The final work, in the church of Santissima Trinità dei Monti in Rome, includes Michelangelo among the witnesses.
Michelangelo: Study of St Lawrence for the Last Judgment
Together with the figure studies displayed on the wall behind, this drawing was probably made some time after the compositional sketches, once Michelangelo’s ideas had developed.
This powerful sheet is a preparatory drawing for the head and body of St Lawrence, an early Christian martyr. In the fresco Michelangelo depicts the martyrs below Christ, holding objects associated with their martyrdom.
St Lawrence was roasted on a gridiron, which he carries over his shoulder.
Ouch!
Michelangelo: The Virgin and St John, studies for a Crucifixion
Michelangelo later developed his drawing of Christ on the Cross as a design for a painting by his frequent collaborator Marcello Venusti. These figures of the Virgin Mary and St John the Evangelist were to be added on each side of the crucified Christ.
Their gestures express a raw emotional response, which invited early viewers to meditate for themselves on Christ’s sacrifice.
Étienne Dupérac (about 1525-1604): Bird’s-eye view of Michelangelo’s design for the Campidoglio
Michelangelo became involved in plans to renovate the Capitoline Hill (Campidoglio) in the 1530s. Finally, in the 1560s, he transformed this unwieldy site into a stately piazza by renovating the Palazzo dei Conservatori.
Construction began in 1563, barely a year before his death. Michelangelo reworked an old window design from the Palazzo Farnese (on the nearby plinth) to design a niche within the new palace.
Étienne Dupérac (about 1525-1604): Elevations of St Peter’s, after a model by Michelangelo
No complete plan for St Peter’s by Michelangelo has survived, but these two prints, allegedly reflecting his emerging scheme, give some idea of his intentions.
Following Bramante’s lead, he devised a centrally planned church topped with a vast dome that was visible for miles around. The result, however, was more impressive still. Stripping Bramante’s design to its essentials, Michelangelo unlocked its latent majesty and monumentality. The basilica’s scale and magnificence made it a potent symbol of the Catholic Church’s power.
West elevation of St Peter’s (exterior), purportedly after Michelangelo. Probably 1569. Etching and engraving.
Michelangelo: The Crucifixion of St Peter, 1541-49
This is a reproduction of the Crucifixion of St Peter from the Vatican Museum used as a background image for the display.
St Peter is being nailed to a cross. The look on his face! Not happy.
This fresco and the Conversion of Saul, both made for the Pope’s private Pauline Chapel, were the last compositions painted by Michelangelo himself.
Marcello Venusti (about 1512-1579): The Annunciation
It struck me that Mary already looks quite pregnant in this painting.
Michelangelo and Venusti developed a second Annunciation composition, which presents the Virgin and the angel in more traditional poses.
The angel’s outstretched hand draws the eye to the Virgin’s womb as the place of Christ’s incarnation.
Traces of underdrawing show the process by which Venusti transferred Michelangelo’s figures. Venusti’s own additions, such as the floor, were laid in with stylus marks.
Michelangelo: The Epifania
This was the centrepiece of the exhibition.
Made on twenty-six joined sheets of paper Michelangelo’s Epifania (Epiphany) is a ‘cartoon’, a full-scale preparatory drawing used to transfer a composition on to another surface.
Cumbersome, prone to damage and much handled, cartoons rarely survive: this is the only complete one that exists from Michelangelo’s entire career.
Showing the Virgin and Child with St John the Baptist and other unidentified figures, it was made by Michelangelo around 1550 for an apparently abandoned work.
In the mid-1550s, he offered the cartoon to his pupil Ascanio Condivi (1525-1574), who developed it into a painting. Both works have recently undergone conservation and are reunited here for the first time since the 1550s.
The Epifania, before conservation. Black chalk on paper, 1550–53. (British Museum website.)
Michelangelo: The Virgin and Child
Michelangelo frequently returned to the theme of the Virgin and Child, elaborated in the Epifania, exploring a relationship that was both unique and universal.
This drawing, on the back of a much earlier poem, may have been designed for Venusti, although no related painting is known.
A later owner silhouetted the figures in gold paint, now removed, so that it resembled a precious icon.
Michelangelo: The Pietà (the ‘Warwick’ Pietà)
The Virgin Mary cradles the body of Christ, her resignation contrasting with the expressive grief of her four companions. Even when Michelangelo was younger, his portrayals of Christ’s final days and Crucifixion were charged with emotion.
This drawing, made when he was around 60, anticipates the intimate pathos with which he treated the subject in his last years.
Michelangelo: Christ on the Cross between the Virgin and St John
I find it very touching that Mary is in close, placing her cheek on Christ’s thigh. All the other depictions in the exhibition had Mary and St John standing further away.
Among Michelangelo’s most moving, intimate expressions of faith is a group of drawings of the Crucifixion, probably made over an extended period of time during the last 10 years of his life.
These works show the elderly artist using the act of drawing as a means of spiritual meditation - making variations on a single theme to explore his feelings about mortality, sacrifice, faith and redemption.
Image from the British Museum website.
Stay tuned for more adventures on our European Odyssey!