![]() I do not think it is appropriate to use architectural elements such as niches, pedestals, pillars, relives, etc. In my opinion, the reconstruction of the freestanding Tomb should not be based on the formal solutions of the wall Tomb projects that survived. ![]() A reason for which the reconstruction here proposed differs significantly from those previously suggested by several scholars (fig. This is true both from the hermeneutical and philosophical meanings as well as from the point of view of the sculptural and architectural solutions. Moving from the idea of an imperial monument represented by the grandiose freestanding mausoleum, to the wall Tomb (recalling the tombs of 15th-century Tuscan tradition with eminently Christian iconographic apparatus), represents a total project change. In 1513 the project of the freestanding Tomb was abandoned in favor of a wall Tomb which will develop, through a series of different versions over the course of more than thirty years, into the construction in 1545 of the Tomb in the church of San Pietro in Vincoli in Rome. After the end of the decoration of the Sistine Ceiling in October 1512 and the subsequent death of Julius II on the night between 20th and 21st February 1513, Michelangelo had to start working again on the Pope’s Tomb. 2-4).Īs in the case of the Tomb, in the Vault, Michelangelo realized (through painting) an architectural structure hosting sculptures. The result is surprising, the reconstructed structure exudes strength, a vibrant power typical of Michelangelo (fig. 1). Scientifically studied in all its individual components, Michelangelo’s frescoes structure responds to an architecture that can be extruded and rendered in three-dimensions. On the Sistine Ceiling Michelangelo painted a fictitious architecture as a basic element, a unitary component of the entire pictorial cycle (fig. Peter church, had definitively turned to the restoration of the ceiling of the family chapel rather than continue the more expensive undertaking of the Tomb. The project of the freestanding Tomb never saw the light also because Julius II involved in the military campaigns of Perugia and Bologna, in addition to the huge expenses for the St. The idea of the circular bronzes is taken from the painted medallions held by the Ignudi in the Sistine Ceiling. ![]() This choice differs from all other previous reconstruction hypotheses which show only rectangular reliefs. For the reconstruction, I have hypothesized both rectangular and circular bronze reliefs. The statues were more than forty, to which are added other marble and bronze reliefs. Perhaps this cornice was similar to that one painted by Michelangelo on the Sistine Ceiling. In the project, the statues “bound…like prisoners” were “rising from the ground and projecting from the monument” above these “ran the cornice that tied all the work together”. According to Condivi, the Tomb “as it was the first drawing” was conceived as a classical building, to put it as Vasari was a “temple”. Since we have not received any contractual document and no design certainly referable to the original four-sided design of the Tomb, we must follow the description of Ascanio Condivi, then taken up with some difference from Giorgio Vasari. ![]() These are the years of the Tomb and Vault during which the artist experienced failure and glory that made him forever immortal. The years from 1505 to 1512 are the most important period of Michelangelo’s artistic career. The tormented events of this ambitious enterprise, which the Pope commissioned to Michelangelo in 1505, lead to a long chain of events that allow us to better understand the relationships with his supreme masterpiece: the fresco of the Sistine Vault. The monument that would accommodate the dead body of the bishop of Rome, the supreme pastor of Christianity, the Pontiff Julius II born Giuliano della Rovere (Pope from 1503 to 1513). A hypothesis that allows identifying similarities between the original design for the Tomb and the Sistine Ceiling frescoes.Įverything started with the project of the Tomb. What was Michelangelo’s initial project for the Tomb of Pope Julius II? The hypothesis proposed here follows Vasari and Condivi’s descriptions of this project. The Tomb Project that Never Saw the Light
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