Artist | Michelangelo |
---|---|
Year | 1492 |
Type | Polychrome wood |
Dimensions | 142 cm× 35 cm(55.9 in× 13.8 in) |
Location | Santo Spirito, Florence |
Preceded by | Battle of the Centaurs (Michelangelo) |
Followed by | St. Petronius (Michelangelo) |
Two different crucifixes, or strictly, wooden corpus sculptures for crucifixes, are attributed to the High Renaissance master Michelangelo, although neither is universally accepted as his. Both are relatively small sculptures that would have been produced during Michelangelo's youth.
One is a polychrome wood sculpture possibly finished in 1492 that had been lost from view by scholars until it re-emerged in 1962. Usually the sculpture is entitled the Santo Spirito Crucifix to reflect its current location. Investigations in 2001 appear to confirm the attribution to Michelangelo and that the sculpture was made for the high altar of the Church of Santo Spirito di Firenze in Florence, Italy. [1]
After the death of his protector, Lorenzo de' Medici, Michelangelo Buonarroti was a guest of the convent of Santa Maria del Santo Spirito in Florence when he was seventeen years old. There he was allowed to make anatomical studies of corpses coming from the convent hospital. In exchange for that opportunity, he is said to have sculpted the wooden crucifix that was placed over the high altar. After an undocumented date the sculpture was moved for display in the convent.
In 1962, Santo Spirito Crucifix was put on display at the museum in Florence that is dedicated to the works of Michelangelo and the history of his family, Casa Buonarroti, and the investigations into its authenticity ensued that confirmed the attribution to Michelangelo in 2001, determining that the sculpture might have been executed as early as 1492. [1]
Today the crucifix is hung in the octagonal sacristy of the Basilica of Santa Maria del Santo Spirito.
The work is especially notable for the fact that Christ is completely naked. The nudity of the figure is true to the Gospels. They assert that the removal of Christ's clothing by the Roman soldiers is the fulfilment of an Old Testament prophecy in Psalm 22:18, "They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture." All of the gospel writers suggest the nakedness, while John supplies the details:
Then the soldiers, when they had crucified Jesus, took his garments, and made four parts, to every soldier a part; and also his coat: now the coat was without seam, woven from the top throughout. They said therefore among themselves, Let us not rend it, but cast lots for it, whose it shall be: that the scripture might be fulfilled, which saith, 'They parted my raiment among them, and for my vesture they did cast lots.' These things therefore the soldiers did.
The sign attached to the cross includes a disparaging epithet the gospel writers report was attached above him to mock Jesus. It is inscribed in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin. The wording translates as, "Jesus of Nazareth King of the Jews". Although it varies slightly among them, all of the evangelists record this inscription. Here the artist favored the rendering from John's Gospel (John 19:19).
Also present in the sculpture is a spear wound recorded similarly as inflicted into the side of Jesus by a Roman soldier. His blood is depicted dripping from the wound on his right side.
In December 2008, the Italian government acquired another polychrome corpus sculpture for a crucifix in limewood from the antique dealer Giancarlo Gallino for €3.2 million, [2] [3] that is less than half the size of the Santo Spirito sculpture. It measures 41.3 by 39.7 centimetres (16.3 in × 15.6 in). The sculpture is entitled, Crucifix Gallino and is displayed at Bargello, a national art museum in Florence. In 2004, this smaller sculpture had been exhibited in the Museo Horne in Florence. [4]
Since this sculpture is not documented by the contemporary biographers of Michelangelo, Ascanio Condivi and Giorgio Vasari, some art historians have attributed the work to Michelangelo based only on stylistic criteria and they have dated its creation to around 1495. [2]
There have been academic debates regarding the authenticity of these two sculptures now attributed to Michelangelo.
In a book published by the Leipzig University Press in 2019, [5] the Milanese restaurator and art historian Antonio Forcellino takes a position in the discussion about the Michelangelo crucifix of Santo Spirito. There he identifies it as a privately-owned wooden sculpture. He attributes this work to Michelangelo not only because of its display of anatomical detail, but mainly due to an epigraph that was inscribed on the back of the work at the beginning of the eighteenth century. [6]
In December 2009, an inquiry was opened into the acquisition of the Bargello crucifix by the Italian state. [7] A journal, Agenzia Nazionale Stampa Associata (ANSA) reports that: "several experts have cast doubts on the attribution, with the doyenne of Michelangelo cross studies, German art historian Margrit Lisner, saying it was probably a Sansovino" sculpture. [7]
Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, known mononymously as Michelangelo, was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect, and poet of the High Renaissance. Born in the Republic of Florence, his work was inspired by models from classical antiquity and had a lasting influence on Western art. Michelangelo's creative abilities and mastery in a range of artistic arenas define him as an archetypal Renaissance man, along with his rival and elder contemporary, Leonardo da Vinci. Given the sheer volume of surviving correspondence, sketches, and reminiscences, Michelangelo is one of the best-documented artists of the 16th century. He was lauded by contemporary biographers as the most accomplished artist of his era.
The Pietà is a Carrara marble sculpture of Jesus and Mary at Mount Golgotha representing the "Sixth Sorrow" of the Virgin Mary by Michelangelo Buonarroti, in Saint Peter's Basilica, Vatican City, for which it was made. It is a key work of Italian Renaissance sculpture and often taken as the start of the High Renaissance.
The Sistine Chapel ceiling, painted in fresco by Michelangelo between 1508 and 1512, is a cornerstone work of High Renaissance art.
The Basilica di San Lorenzo is one of the largest churches of Florence, Italy, situated at the centre of the main market district of the city, and it is the burial place of all the principal members of the Medici family from Cosimo il Vecchio to Cosimo III. It is one of several churches that claim to be the oldest in Florence, having been consecrated in 393 AD, at which time it stood outside the city walls. For three hundred years it was the city's cathedral, before the official seat of the bishop was transferred to Santa Reparata.
The Bargello, also known as the Palazzo del Bargello or Palazzo del Popolo, is a former barracks and prison in Florence, Italy. Since 1865, it has housed the Museo Nazionale del Bargello, a national art museum.
The Agony and the Ecstasy (1961) is a biographical novel of Michelangelo Buonarroti written by American author Irving Stone. Stone lived in Italy for years visiting many of the locations in Rome and Florence, worked in marble quarries, and apprenticed himself to a marble sculptor. A primary source for the novel is Michelangelo's correspondence, all 495 letters of which Stone had translated from Italian by Charles Speroni and published in 1962 as I, Michelangelo, Sculptor. Stone also collaborated with Canadian sculptor Stanley Lewis, who researched Michelangelo's carving technique and tools. The Italian government lauded Stone with several honorary awards for his cultural achievements highlighting Italian history.
Bacchus (1496–1497) is a marble sculpture by the Italian High Renaissance sculptor, painter, architect and poet Michelangelo. The statue is somewhat over life-size and represents Bacchus, the Roman god of wine, in a reeling pose suggestive of drunkenness. Commissioned by Raffaele Riario, a high-ranking Cardinal and collector of antique sculpture, it was rejected by him and was bought instead by Jacopo Galli, Riario's banker and a friend to Michelangelo. Together with the Pietà, the Bacchus is one of only two surviving sculptures from the artist's first period in Rome.
Niccolò di Raffaello di Niccolò dei Pericoli, called "Il Tribolo" was an Italian Mannerist artist in the service of Cosimo I de' Medici in his natal city of Florence.
The Basilica di Santo Spirito is a church in Florence, Italy. Usually referred to simply as Santo Spirito, it is located in the Oltrarno quarter, facing the square with the same name. The interior of the building – internal length 97 m (318 ft) – is one of the preeminent examples of Renaissance architecture.
The Entombment is an unfinished oil-on-panel painting of the burial of Jesus, now generally attributed to the Italian Renaissance master Michelangelo Buonarroti and dated to around 1500 or 1501. It is in the National Gallery in London, which purchased the work in 1868 from Robert Macpherson, a Scottish photographer resident in Rome, who, according to various conflicting accounts, had acquired the painting there some 20 years earlier. It is one of a handful of paintings attributed to Michelangelo, alongside the Manchester Madonna, the Doni Tondo, and possibly, The Torment of Saint Anthony.
Benedetto Buglioni (1459/1460–1521) was an important Italian Renaissance sculptor specialised in glazed terracotta.
Casa Buonarroti is a museum in Florence, Italy that is situated on property owned by the sculptor Michelangelo that he left to his nephew, Leonardo Buonarroti. The complex of buildings was converted into a museum dedicated to the artist by his great nephew, Michelangelo Buonarroti the Younger. Its collections include two of Michelangelo's earliest marble sculptures, the Madonna of the Stairs and the Battle of the Centaurs. A ten-thousand book library includes the family archive and some of Michelangelo's letters and drawings. The Galleria is decorated with paintings commissioned by Buonarroti the Younger and was created by Artemisia Gentileschi and other early seventeenth-century Italian artists.
Michelangelo had a complicated relationship with the Medici family, who were for most of his lifetime the effective rulers of his home city of Florence. The Medici rose to prominence as Florence's preeminent bankers. They amassed a sizable fortune some of which was used for patronage of the arts. Michelangelo's first contact with the Medici family began early as a talented teenage apprentice of the Florentine painter Domenico Ghirlandaio. Following his initial work for Lorenzo de' Medici, Michelangelo's interactions with the family continued for decades including the Medici papacies of Pope Leo X and Pope Clement VII.
Battle of the Centaurs is a relief sculpture by the Italian Renaissance artist Michelangelo, created around 1492. It was the last work Michelangelo created while under the patronage of Lorenzo de' Medici, who died shortly after its completion. Inspired by a classical relief created by Bertoldo di Giovanni, the marble sculpture represents the mythic battle between the Lapiths and the Centaurs. A popular subject of art in ancient Greece, the story was suggested to Michelangelo by the classical scholar and poet Poliziano. The sculpture is exhibited in the Casa Buonarroti in Florence, Italy.
The Pietà for Vittoria Colonna is a black chalk drawing on cardboard (28.9×18.9 cm) attributed to Michelangelo Buonarroti, dated to about 1538–44 and kept at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston.
The Pitti Tondo is an unfinished marble relief of the Virgin and Child by Michelangelo in round or tondo form. It was executed between 1503 and 1504 while he was residing in Florence and is now in the Museo nazionale del Bargello in Florence.
Brutus is a marble bust of Marcus Junius Brutus sculpted by Michelangelo around 1539–1540. It is now in the Bargello museum in Florence.
Apollo, also known as Apollo-David, David-Apollo, or Apollino, is a 1.46 m unfinished marble sculpture by Michelangelo that dates from approximately 1530. It now stands in the Bargello museum in Florence.
Ripatransone Cathedral is a Roman Catholic cathedral and minor basilica in the town of Ripatransone, province of Ascoli Piceno, region of Marche, Italy. It is located on Piazza Ascanio Condivi. The cathedral is dedicated to Saint Gregory the Great and to Saint Margaret. It was formerly the episcopal seat of the Diocese of Ripatransone but is now a co-cathedral in the Diocese of San Benedetto del Tronto-Ripatransone-Montalto.
The Brunelleschi Crucifix is a polychrome painted wooden sculpture by the Italian artist Filippo Brunelleschi, made from pearwood around 1410-1415, and displayed since 1572 in the Gondi Chapel at the church of Santa Maria Novella in Florence. This idealised depiction of the crucifixion of Jesus measures around 170 cm × 170 cm. It is the only surviving wooden sculpture by Brunelleschi: the only other known example, a wooden sculpture of Mary Magdalene at the church of Santo Spirito, was destroyed in a fire in 1471. In his 2002 book, Masaccio e le origini del Rinascimento, the art historian Luciano Bellosi described Brunelleschi's crucifix as "probably the first Renaissance work in the history of art", representing a definitive turn away from the stylised postures of Gothic sculpture and a return to the naturalism of classical sculpture.
Media related to Santo Spirito Crucifix by Michelangelo Buonarroti at Wikimedia Commons