The divine 'Miguel Ángel'

THE GREAT MICHAEL ANGEL

THE GREAT FIGURE OF THE ITALIAN RENAISSANCE

BY: CARLOS RANGEL (YOORS BLOGGER)

Miguel Ángel Buonarroti, Italian sculptor, painter and architect. Michelangelo is usually recognized as the great figure of the Italian Renaissance, a man whose exceptional artistic personality dominated the creative scene of the 16th century and whose figure is at the basis of the artist's conception as an exceptional being, which far exceeds ordinary conventions. He developed his artistic work over more than seventy years between Florence and Rome, where his great patrons, the Medici family of Florence and the different Roman popes lived. He was the first western artist of which two biographies were published in life: Le vite de' più eccellenti pittori, scultori and architettori by Giorgio Vasari, published in 1550 in its first edition, in which he was the only living artist included, and Vita by Michelangelo Buonarroti , written in 1553 by Ascanio Condivi, painter and disciple of Michelangelo, which collects the data provided by Buonarroti himself. He was very admired by his contemporaries, who called him the Divine . He triumphed in all the arts in which he worked, characterized by his perfectionism.The sculpture, as he had stated, was his favorite and the first to which he dedicated himself; then painting, almost as an imposition by Pope Julius II, and which took place in an exceptional work, the vault of the Sistine Chapel; and already in its last years, he carried out architectural projects. He was the author of numerous works, of which today there are between 40 and 50 sculptures, 4 paintings, several dozen drawings and frescoes in the Sistine Chapel and the Pauline Chapel.

During the nearly seventy years of his career, Michelangelo cultivated painting, sculpture and architecture alike, with extraordinary results in each of these artistic facets; in this sense he surpassed the other two great masters of the Cinquecento: Rafael Sanzio, focusing almost exclusively on painting, and Leonardo da Vinci , as multifaceted and excellent as he is but parco in effective accomplishments. His peers saw in Michelangelo's creations a quality, called terribilità , to which the greatness of his genius can be attributed; the term refers to aspects such as physical vigor, emotional intensity and creative enthusiasm, true constant in the works of this artist that give them his inimitable greatness and personality.

Michelangelo's life was between Florence and Rome, cities where he left his masterpieces. He learned painting in Domenico Ghirlandaio's workshop and sculpture in the garden of the Medici, which had gathered an exceptional collection of ancient statues. He took his first steps by making copies of frescoes by Giotto or Masaccio that helped him define his style.