“Almost exactly five hundred years ago, a tormented soul named Michelangelo built a very narrow bridge in the middle of the air… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Michelangelo was aiming with his frescoes, we modestly suggest that if he had dared to give the giant artwork a title he… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Michelangelo’s genius was in allowing the viewer to see a great deal—in order not to show what is best left secret, except… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“In The Last Judgment, just as Mary is turning away from the severe judgment of Jesus, there is a deeper meaning: Michelangelo… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Let’s start with Michelangelo’s predecessors. What did they want the chapel to say, and what relevance, if any, do these ideas still… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“In his last years, Michelangelo worked on new pietà sculptures—not for any pope, but for his own diversion and probably for his… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Michelangelo then summarily fired his Roman staff of assistants. He next sent for five longtime friends, all artists with experience in fresco… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“The ambitious pope had already discussed the Sistine ceiling with Michelangelo in 1506, probably while they were together in Bologna. No doubt… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Their love, however, was the epitome of what we today would label “platonic.” They loved each other’s minds. Michelangelo was thrilled to… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“How to maintain the proper mood and not bore the congregation to sleep? Art was the answer. But not just pretty pictures… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“He hauled in Michelangelo, commanding the aged maestro to make the naked figures in The Last Judgment “suitable” for the papal chapel.… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Michelangelo was entranced by this ancient masterpiece, the result of three top Greek sculptors working as a team on the island of… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“expensive paint jobs in history. Michelangelo began at the top of the wall and slowly worked his way down for more than… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Still, the rebellious artist had placed a minor Jewish prophet in the important spot where the pope had wanted Jesus. How did… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“In Jewish tradition, we find the cautionary adage “Be in the world, but not of the world.” In the Gospels, Jesus says:… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“the original commission for the ceiling was a plan designed by the pope and his closest advisers. Jesus was to have been… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Leonardo da Vinci and the much younger Michelangelo had often made it clear that they had no respect for each other’s craft.… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“When Michelangelo came along a generation after the original fresco masters, he took on the almost-impossible task of linking the whole Sistine… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“In 1510 the pope ordered the scaffolding dismantled and the first part of the fresco displayed to an eager public. The ecstatic… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“So what was Michelangelo’s real message? “SELF-PORTRAIT OF THE ARTIST”? A more profound and legitimate explanation of the Sistine is that perhaps… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“The goal was to teach and spiritually transform its viewers. But in what way? We have already unveiled many of the artist’s… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“sit well with Michelangelo. The project seemed like a series of insurmountable challenges: •It would be the largest fresco on earth—there would… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Michelangelo knew that for the Church to fulfill the will of God, it had to become a paradigm of true brotherhood. There… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“What, then, is the unifying theme, if any, of these four different corner panels that might account for their selection by Michelangelo?… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Thus, Michelangelo filled the chapel with hidden messages of his passionate loves and his righteous rages, along with mystic symbols of divine… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Michelangelo managed to join the preexisting flooring with his new ceiling design into a unique statement. The result was an uncanny illustration… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Giudizio Universale, the Last Judgment. In the Christian tradition, this is when Jesus returns to earth to discern between right and wrong,… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“It is likely that this very maelstrom of conflicted impulses is what has foiled all previous attempts to come up with a… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Yet, to view the Sistine primarily as a self-portrait doesn’t ring totally true. In spite of his arrogance regarding his artistic skill,… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Leonardo was renowned as a painter, and Michelangelo (thanks to his Battle of the Centaurs and the David) was known for portraying… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Michelangelo, who had already spent much time studying Roman architecture in the ruins, proposed a revolutionary “flying bow bridge” scaffold. It was… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“Just as Shakespeare filled his works with straightforward storylines, sex, violence, and bawdy jokes for the “groundlings” (the uneducated peasants who stood… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share Image
“If an artist of the caliber of Leonardo or Michelangelo was paid a hefty commission for a new private piece of art, that artwork… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“The Florentine public didn’t care. When the full-sized preparatory cartoons were displayed, the entire city went into ecstasy over both works. This was the… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“The floor is a fifteenth-century revival of medieval Cosmatesque mosaic style. The Cosmati family developed their unmistakable technique in Rome in the twelfth and… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“Carafa, as Pope Paul IV, established the Index of Forbidden Books, banned all women from entering the Vatican, burnt volumes of Talmud and Kabbalah,… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“The Vatican preached that because the Jews had killed Jesus and rejected his teachings they were punished with the loss of their Holy Temple… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“The Jew cannot accept the New Testament since it is the words of one man intended to undo what the Creator had shared with… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“THE VATICAN The very name Vatican comes from a surprising source. It is neither Latin nor Greek, nor is it of biblical origin. In… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“Buonarroti was later given the job of designing the huge dome of the new Basilica of St. Peter. It is well known how much… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“How to maintain the proper mood and not bore the congregation to sleep? Art was the answer. But not just pretty pictures that required… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“Yet another strategy for encoding in Renaissance works involved environmental “special effects.” Messages were ingeniously inserted so that they could be viewed only when… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“But last and least known is its additional purpose as a Kabbalistic meditational device that thus, in one more way, links it to ancient… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“Thus, Michelangelo filled the chapel with hidden messages of his passionate loves and his righteous rages, along with mystic symbols of divine justice and… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“He infused his ceiling fresco with Kabbalistic images that reflected the Kabbalistic pavement design below. He linked the Jewish ancestral tree to Jesus. He… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“In 1510 the pope ordered the scaffolding dismantled and the first part of the fresco displayed to an eager public. The ecstatic reactions from… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
“In Jewish tradition, we find the cautionary adage “Be in the world, but not of the world.” In the Gospels, Jesus says: “Render unto… — Benjamin Blech Copy Share
