Why Michelangelo Matters

Commentary ^ | 09/06 | Theodore K. Rabb

[Republicanprofessor]

What is it, in this age of hype and empty celebrity, that makes the name of Michelangelo so magnetic? One can perhaps understand the draw when Van Gogh or the Impressionists take over a museum. These are the prophets of a modern sensibility: lyrical, colorful, yet with an edge of experimentation and a tinge of revolt. Michelangelo, by contrast, is remote, often deliberately unapproachable, cerebral, scathingly hard on himself (and all around him), and devoted to values, both aesthetic and spiritual, that are now long gone.

[Republicanprofessor]

I love Michelangelo's work. He was an amazing painter, sculptor, and architect. No other artist has that claim. Plus there is a wonderful tension in his art: epitomizing the very struggle of life itself. It is this that resounds through the ages.

[Republicanprofessor]

Art ping.

Let Sam Cree, Woofie or me know if you want on or off this Art ping list.

[Dante3]

Ditto.

[JRios1968]

Leonardo, Donatello and Raphael couldn't be reached for comment...

[kitkat]

As usual, the reviewer reads more into the work than the creator intended.

Otherwise, it was an excellent read. Thanks, RP.

[Blind Eye Jones]

Michaelangelo is not important. What is important is what comes through Michaelangelo, the endless streams of qualities and attributes that we relate to, the profoundity of expression for the worldly and unworldly. Michaelangelo holds a mirror up to the natural and supernatural and the frailty of his flesh never gets in the way. Compared to Beethoven, we don't have all the near misses, a notebook of imperfect possibilities and many drafts; rather there is perfection in everything. Like a jazz musician there is never a wrong note, only endless variations on life even amongst the simple throw away sketches. This leads me to conclude that there never was a Michaelangelo the artist, only the person in the guise of greatness for whom the greatness act through within a visible medium.

[LexBaird]

He was an amazing painter, sculptor, and architect. No other artist has that claim.

How about Da Vinci?

[theFIRMbss]

>Michelangelo

Wilson Key's question: Just what were Adam and Eve doing right before Michelangelo snapped his famous photograph of the young couple . . .

[LexBaird]

Also, perhaps, Phidias. Although none of his paintings survive, he was reputed to be a master of that as well as sculpture and architecture.

[spankalib]

Lewinski.

Interesting. The medium truly is the massage.