““It is likely that this very maelstrom of conflicted impulses is what has foiled all previous attempts to come up with a “unified theory” of the chapel’s meaning. Any true portrait of a human being must be multifaceted. To portray the turbulent passions, loves, and hatreds of the great Michelangelo required the whole ceiling and front wall of the Sistine. As the famed British architect Sir Christopher Wren summed up his own life and works with the words, “If you want to see my monument, look around you,” Michelangelo may have chosen to write his autobiography on the chapel ceiling.””
