Sculpture and Form
Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564) was the defining genius of the High Renaissance — sculptor of David and the Pietà, painter of the Sistine Chapel ceiling, and architect of St Peter's dome. He saw himself, above all, as a sculptor freeing figures from the marble.
He raised the artist from craftsman to divine creator — contemporaries already called him Il Divino, the Divine One.
Michelangelo painted the 500 m² Sistine ceiling over four years, mostly standing and craning backwards — not lying down, as legend claims — and wrote a poem about the agony it caused his neck and eyes.
Source: Wikipedia / Wikimedia
Key works
Works with a dedicated ArtAtlas page are highlighted in gold.
1511
The Creation of Adam, also known as The Creation of Man, is a fresco painting by Italian artist Michelangelo, which forms part of the Sistine Chapel's ceiling, painted 1508–1512. It illustrates the Biblical creation narrative from the Book of Genesis in which God gives life to Adam, the first man.
1600
1500
Michelangelo carved the giant from a single block of marble that two other sculptors had already given up on as ruined.
FAQ
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Michelangelo Buonarroti lived from 1475 to 1564: he was born at Caprese in Tuscany and died in Rome a few weeks short of his 89th birthday. His working life spanned almost the whole High Renaissance.
Michelangelo made the human body the main language of art: anatomy and the twist of a figure carry the whole meaning. He worked as sculptor, painter and architect, and contemporaries already called him Il Divino, the Divine One.
Most people name David — the marble figure over five metres tall, carved in the early 1500s and kept in the Galleria dell'Accademia in Florence. The Creation of Adam on the Sistine Chapel ceiling is just as recognisable.
The only work he ever signed is the Pietà in St Peter's, with his name cut into the band across the Virgin's chest. Vasari says he did it after overhearing the statue credited to another sculptor.
