Michelangelo
1475-1564
The genius was born in Italy | Youth.
Years of study.
1488-1495 / Rome.
"Pieta".
1496-1501 / Florence.
"David".
1501-1505 / Rome.
Tomb of Pope Julius II.
1505-1545 / Rome.
Frescoes of the Sistine Chapel vault.
1508-1512 / Florence.
The Medici tombs.
1516-1534 / Rome.
Late works.
"The Last Judgment".
1534-1541 / Architecture.
The Cathedral of St. Peter.
1538-1564 | site map | home page
2.
Youth.
Years of study (1488-1495)
Study in the workshop of Ghirlandaio (1488-1489)
Dominico Ghirlandaio, the famous Florentine painter, mentor of Francesco Granacci, a friend of the young Michele, drew attention to the boy and told him to bring something from his drawings, the artist saw in these timid samples living glimpses of talent.
Ghirlandaio ran an art school where he taught boys the art of painting and sculpture.
The next day, Domenico went to Michelangelo's father to ask him to give his son to him for training.
With great reluctance, my father agreed.
On April 1, 1488, at the age of 13, Michelangelo became a student of the artist brothers Domenico and David Ghirlandaio.
The step is done.
A happy Michelangelo is in the workshop of his teacher.
The workshop was then just a shop, and not a formal salon, as it is now.
Most often, boys began to learn a craft at the age of 10 in craft workshops - from painters, jewelers, architects, sculptors.
Often the master master was all this in one person, and the young man studied under his guidance not only one kind of art, but the whole art as a whole.
At the Ghirlandaio School, the young Michelangelo got acquainted with the basic materials and techniques.
He studied the art of wall painting on raw plaster.
Fresco painting was very popular during the Italian Renaissance.
Early pencil copies of the works of the great Florentine artists Giotto and Masaccio, made by Michelangelo's hand, demonstrate his characteristic sculptural interpretation of forms.
"Over time, many children were born to Lodovico, and since his life was bad and he had little income, he attached his sons to the wool and silk workshop, and Michelangelo, when he grew up, gave them to the teacher Francesco from Urbino to learn to read and write.
But since he was attracted by his genius to drawing, he secretly spent all his free time drawing, for which his father and his elders scolded him, and sometimes beat him, probably considering that the occupation of this art, unknown to them, was a low and unworthy of their ancient family.
Michelangelo then became friends with Francesco Granacci, who was at the same young age, and settled under Domenico del Ghirlandaio to study the art of painting: therefore, Granacci, who fell in love with Michelangelo and seeing how capable he was of drawing, every day supplied him with drawings by Ghirlandaio, who at that time was considered one of the best masters not only in Florence, but throughout Italy.
And so, since Michelangelo's desire for creativity was growing every day, and Lodovico could no longer prevent the young man from drawing, and since there was no other way out, in order to extract at least some benefit from this and so that he could learn this art, Lodovico, on the advice of friends, decided to arrange him with Domenico Ghirlandaio.
Michelangelo's skill and personality grew so much that Domenico was amazed to see how he did some things not as a young man should, because it seemed to him that Michelangelo not only overcomes other students, and there were many of them at Ghirlandaio, but also often does not yield to him in things created by him as a master.
So, when one of the young men who studied with Domenico drew several figures of dressed women with a pen from Ghirlandaio, Michelangelo snatched this sheet from him and with a thicker pen re circled the figure of one of the women with lines in a manner that he considered more perfect, so that not only the difference in both manners is striking, but also the skill and taste of such a bold and daring young man who had the spirit to correct the work of his teacher" Vasari.
Michelangelo was in his fourteenth year when, among other students, he, in the first year of his admission to the studio, began to help the artist in his work.
He had already surprised his teachers and comrades more than once with his success, especially with the correctness of the drawing and the excellent copying of the engraving.
He aroused the greatest surprise in the teacher himself with his copy of the famous engraving by Schongauer depicting the "atonement of St. Anthony".
From this copy on an enlarged scale, Michelangelo made a picture, painting it with paints.
Michelangelo's contemporaries even claimed that he was already correcting the teacher's drawings when he received them for copying, and that Ghirlandaio should have recognized his superiority in drawing knowledge.
"And so it happened that when Domenico was working in the great chapel in Santa Maria Novella and somehow came out of there, Michelangelo began to draw from nature a plank stage with several tables filled with all the accessories of art, as well as several young men who worked there.
It was not for nothing that when Domenico returned and saw Michelangelo's drawing, he declared: "Well, this one knows more than mine" - so he was struck by the new manner and new way of reproducing nature, which, by the verdict of heaven, this young man was gifted at such a tender age, and indeed the drawing was such that one could not have wished for more from the skill of an artist who had been working for many years.
The fact is that in his nature, brought up by teaching and art, everything was contained that is known and accessible to creative gratitude, which in Michelangelo daily brought more and more divine fruits, which clearly began to be revealed in a copy made by him from one engraved sheet of the German Martin and brought him the widest fame, namely: when one of the stories of the named Martin, engraved on copper, on which the devils torture St. Michelangelo drew it with a pen, in a manner hitherto unknown, and painted it with paints, and in order to reproduce the bizarre appearance of some devils, he bought fish with scales of unusual colors and thus discovered such skill in this work that he gained both respect and fame" Vasari.
Michelangelo stayed in the studio of Ghirlandaio for a little more than a year, not three, as was customary in those days.
Many years later, Michelangelo claimed that he had learned little from Ghirlandaio.
However, it was at this school that he acquired the skills of fresco painting, which he later successfully applied to painting the vault of the Sistine Chapel.
Perhaps it was Ghirlandaio who introduced the young Michelangelo to the art of sculpting.
The master admired early Greek and Roman sculptures and stone carvings, and infected his student with his passion.
Already in 1489, Michelangelo moved to the art school founded by the ruler of Florence, Lorenzo de ' Medici.
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