The chapel occupies
the upper floor of a fortified centre in the Apostolic
Palaces. Right from the beginning (1474), the room
dedicated to the Assumption - planned on the size of the
Temple of Solomon - was the pontifical chapel and seat
of the Conclaves. The restoration works promoted by
Sixtus IV in 1477 gave it a precious mosaic floor and
marble transennas, which were moved later to enlarge the
area reserved for the clergy.
The two cycles of the Old and NewTestaments, frescoed
between 1481 and '83 by Pinturicchio, Botticelli, Cosimo
Rosselli, by Ghirlandaio and students began with scenes,
later destroyed, of the finding of Moses and the
Nativity of Christ completed by Perugino on the wall
behind the altar where the Michelangelo "The last
judgment" is now.
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After the appearance of cracks in
the walls of the Sistine Chapel in 1574, Michelangelo was
commissioned to work on a new decoration for the vault, in
the place ofthe starry sky, painted by Pier Matteo d'Amelia
during the time of Sixtus IV. Despite the commission, it
proved to be particularly onerous for the artist, engaged on
the interminable project for the grave of Julius 11, the
contract was stipulated on 10th May, 1508. Right from the
beginning, he wanted to emphasise the" difficulty of the
work'; sustained by a only a small payment and the an
guish of not succeeding in the titanic painting, that the
sculptor knew was not his profession.
Having overcome the early technical problems, special
scaffolding was erected.The helpers who had arrived from
Florence were a reason for dissatisfaction by Michelangelo
who, in the end, decided to "throw out everything they had
done'; It has been possible to find, through the weaker
details of the first scenes near the entrance, the biggest
operation by the helpers who, from the autumn of 1509, would
be more and more limited to the ornamental parts and
tied to the works of much less able painters.
The choice of subject was similarly complex, originally
including only the series of twelve Apostles arranged around
the central area with geometrical decorations, later changed
into the most articulated iconographic programme imposed by
Buonarotti.
It is possible to interpret the architectural framework of
the ceiling as a symbolic path where the
fate of mankind has already been marked, form primordial
chaos to the Redemption. An indispensable introduction to
the events illustrated in the two cycles of 15th century
frescoes on the lower walls where there is a constant
parallel between the Mosaic events and the life of Christ.
From the lunettes and the respective ribbing where Christ's
ancestors, beginning with Abraham, are portrayed, to the
four corner-stones which narrate the heroic undertakings of
David, Judith, Moses and Esther as far as the marble thrones
occupied by the series of Prophets and Sibyls, the divine
intervention for the salvation of man is always exalted. |
In the fields of the ceiling,
flanked by monochroma reliefs of biblical episodes, five
scenes ( the Creation of light, the Separation of the earth
from the waters, the Creation of Eve, the Sacrifice and the
Inebriation of Noah) alternate with another four episodes
from Genesis. The decoration above the cornice, in the large
celestial ceiling, illustrates the mythical origins of the
world (the Creation of the Stars and the Planets), populated
by the forefathers (the Creation of Adam and The Original
sin), up to the mythical Flood.
The work method used, starting with the last scene and, that
is, from the first fresco done, allowed Michelangelo to
proceed directly in the elaboration of the design and then
to transposition through the traditional technique of
pouncing or pricking directly into the fresh plaster.The
fluid and transparent brushwork, soaked with light, exalts
the plasticity of the enormous bodies, while the gamma of
cold and changing colours emerged after the recent
restorations (1980-89) offer an unedited version of
Michelangelo's art.
Even if Julius II succeeded in seeing the grandiose work
finished after the opening of the chapel on 31St October
1512, the commitment in completing the project with the Last
Judgement on the wall behind the altar and in that of the
entrance (where the Fall of the Rebelling Angels was
foreseen) was due to Clement VII. Although already begun,
the entire work was then
carried out on a smaller scale, at the expense of his
successor, Paul III Farnese, maybe portrayed by the artist
in the clothes of St. Peter.
The construction of the scaffolding and the removal of the
frescoes, including the pair of lunettes in the ceiling that
Michelangelo himself had painted, was begun on 16th April,
1535. Michelangelo was disposed to continue only after the
demolition of the plaster that, on the advice of the
Venetian, Sebastiano del Piombo, had been set up for oil
painting and not, as the artist wanted, for the more
traditional fresco technique.The tremendous apocalyptic
vision - certainly relating to the Sack of Roma in 1527
turned around the supreme gesture of Christ the Judge who
marks the resurrection by the ascent of the appointed to the
left and, to the right, the inexorable fall of the damned,
into the violent maelstrom which the same angels are
involved in, nowtransporting the instruments ofthe Passion,
now to drive back the sinners to the presence of Minos
wrapped round by a serpent. In his clothes, Michelangelo
wanted to portray, according to Vassari, one of the first
censors of the work, according to whom, the fresco "was not
a work for the Chapel of the Pope but of stoves and taverns"!
The decision to destroy the frescoes pointed out by Paul IV
- mitigated by the Council ofTrent on the 2pt January, 1564
shortly before the death of Buonarotti -was carried out the
year after with the veiling of the nudity by his disciple
Oaniele da Volterra, from then on known by the nickname of"
Braghettone':
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