Michelangelo: The Man and the Myth
A Preview of Exhibition About Italian High Renaissance Master
The show was mounted in a smaller format as The Face of Michelangelo at Florence's Casa Buonarroti. In New York, a larger presentation appears at the SUArt Galleries on the campus of Syracuse University (August 12-October 19, 2008) and the Louise and Bernard Palitz Gallery at the institution's Joseph I. Lubin House in Manhattan (November 4, 2008-January 4, 2009).
The exhibition is organized by Pina Ragionieri, Director of the Casa Buonarroti, Gary M. Radke, Professor of Fine Arts at Syracuse University and Domenic Iacono, Director of the SUArt Galleries and the Palitz Gallery. Radke was most recently the curator of the successful exhibition The Gates of Paradise: Lorenzo Ghiberti's Renaissance Masterpiece that traveled to four American museums in 2007-08.
On Display
Twelve figural drawings and architectural studies, a madrigal, four epitaphs and other writings by Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475-1564) elucidate the character of the irascible High Renaissance genius. Five drawings and three manuscript pages by the artist's hand have never been seen in the United States. These are accompanied by more than a dozen works by the master's contemporaries, among them painter Marcello Venusti (ca. 1515-1579), portrait sculptor Leone Leoni (1509-1590) and engraver Giorgio Ghisi (1520-1582). Venusti's remarkable Portrait of Michelangelo Buonarroti (post-1535) is a highlight of the exhibition. Together they demonstrate the reverence paid to the artist by his peers.
Michelangelo's Achievements
Known largely for his colossal sculpture David (1501-04) and his glorious Sistine Chapel ceiling frescoes (1508-12), Michelangelo was also a highly skilled anatomist, architect, military engineer and poet. His accomplishments as a draftsman and scholar well-versed in the structure of the human body are evident in his powerful Study for a Christ in Limbo (1530-33) and dramatic Sacrifice of Isaac (ca. 1535). The exhibition examines these and other aspects of the master's long and arduous career.
Installations
Michelangelo: The Man and the Myth features sketches and preparatory studies of nudes for the Sistine Chapel ceiling, Roman monuments, a church, a fortification and a gate (identified as the Porta Pia, an entranceway through Rome's city walls). Many were rendered in black graphite and pen and ink; others were executed using brown watercolor washes or red graphite.
At the SUArt Galleries, Michelangelo's works are mounted separately from those of his contemporaries. A reading room with computer terminals dedicated to resources on the master is centrally located within the installation. Nineteenth-century photographs of Michelangelo's public art in Florence and Rome, engravings of the Sistine Chapel and a 14-foot scale reproduction of the Porta Pia are exhibited elsewhere in the building. The Lubin House's presentation in the Palitz Gallery and 1870 Room is devoted exclusively to Michelangelo's works from the Casa Buonarroti.
Sources:
- Chapman, Hugo. Michelangelo Drawings: Closer to the Artist (exh. cat.). New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2005.
- Joannides, Paul. Michelangelo and His Influence: Drawings from Windsor Castle (exh. cat.). Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1996.
- Ragionieri, Pina and Gary M. Radke. Michelangelo: Drawings and Other Treasures from the Casa Buonarroti, Florence (exh. cat.). Atlanta: High Museum of Art, 2001.
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