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A Brief Look at the Sistine Chapel CeilingIt is widely acknowledged that Michelangelo’s frescoes on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel are the greatest achievement in Western art, having inspired artists through the ages to use its styles and motifs in their own work. Since its unveiling 490 years ago, this complex masterpiece has transfixed countless viewers through its historical illustrations and predominant themes of the human experience. Michelangelo’s decoration of the ceiling is a monument to the extraordinary creative and integrative capacities of the mind (Oremland,1). Many of the historical records which traced its progress, technique, cost, and time spent on it have been lost or destroyed. Thus, the questions of how, when, and why Michelangelo painting the ceiling have been the topic of much debate over the centuries. Recently even more controversy arose when the ceiling was cleaned and restored to its original color and beauty. Nevertheless, as the work is better understood, the universality of themes which give it vitality and endurance is better appreciated.The Sistine Chapel was begun by Pope Sixtus IV probably in 1475, the year Michelangelo was born. It was built to serve functional and symbolic purposes. Functionally, it was to be a fortress into wh . . .
The second and third sections comprise the Ceiling itself. Buon fresco begins with the choice of a good plaster. Its most important function was to house the congregation during its selection of the papal successor (Oremland, 33). The first, at the altar side of the chapel, is God Separating Light from Darkness, and the last, at the entrance door, is the Drunkenness of Noah. Pope Sixtus’s nephew, Julius II, was certainly the greatest of patrons to Michelangelo. His work was characterized by the profound knowledge and rigorous technique that was typical of the fresco painters of the Renaissance. Michelangelo was discouraged by this and almost abandoned the project but he was taught how to remove the mold by a man named Giuliano da Sangallo. When Michelangelo painted the ancestors of Christ in the lunettes of the ceiling, he chose to paint them in sitting and kneeling poses and he also used darker, somber colors. It is difficult to determine what the overall theme is that Michelangelo intended to portray in the Ceiling. It is suggested that one of the themes was the neo-Platonic revolutionary idea that humankind is God and that the Renaissance is a theological formulation of the idea that God is the creation of the mind. (He had to stand on the scaffolding with his head thrown back on his shoulders, not lying down, as is sometimes said). The ceiling is divided into three sections. In fresco painting, the earth colors are diluted with water and are fixed by the transparent calcium carbonate that forms when the plaster dries. Common topics in this essay: | |||
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