OUR ILLUSTRATIONS

It is difficult to grasp all the sublime significance of Michelangelo's works, even when we find ourselves face to face with the actual masterpieces, such as the frescoes of the Sistine Chapel or the beautiful statues which adorn the Medicean tombs.

To attempt an accurate description of his principal works within the narrow limits at our disposal would be indeed a hopeless task, especially as the size of these pictures will only allow of their conveying a somewhat remote idea of the grandeur and awe-inspiring dignity which are the principal characteristics of Michelangelo's art.

In selecting the following eight illustrations, we have endeavoured not only to give an idea of Michelangelo's gradual artistic development, but also to throw some light on his powerful and most interesting personality. Although the Portrait now in the Capitol Museum is in many respects inferior to the one in the Uffizi, and has even fewer claims to the honour of being regarded as by the master's own hand, we have selected it because it tallies perfectly with the descriptions which Michelangelo's contemporaries, and more especially Condivi and Vasari, have left us of the master's rugged and expressive features. There is an aspect of profound melancholy, almost of discouragement, in the wan face, disfigured by the flattened nose; the eyes are sunk deep under the massive and somewhat slanting brow, and the whole picture has an indescribably mournful, hopeless expression. It was probably painted when Michelangelo was about fifty-five years of age, and the tragedy of the tomb was causing him bitter grief and disappointment. In the Uffizi portrait the most interesting feature is the hand, strangely resembling an eagle's talon and immediately giving the impression of strong individuality and creative power, which were Michelangelo's most striking characteristics.

It has been rightly observed that nothing closes the fifteenth century so fitly as the magnificent marble group of The PietÃ , which, although carved by Michelangelo in 1498, already prophesied the power of sixteenth-century art. Numerous other artists had already been attracted by the pathetic theme of the Virgin Mother mourning over her dead Son, their principal aim, however, being almost invariably to convey as forcibly as possible to the beholder the grief and despair of the bereaved Mother. With characteristic originality Michelangelo departed from the traditional manner, successfully endeavouring to give the theme a simpler but far more dignified and lofty interpretation. The Madonna is seated on the stone upon which the Cross is erected, with her dead Son on her lap. Her beautiful face is not contracted with grief, but wears an expression of sublime peace and resignation, and the graceful head reclines slightly on her right shoulder, as if pitying Heaven had sent sleep to temper the extremity of her grief, and sweet dreams of the past, when the Virgin Mother fondled her Infant Son, had mercifully cancelled the horrible vision of the Redeemer's lifeless body now lying on her lap.

Michelangelo's contemporaries criticised the figure of the Madonna, remarking that the Mother is far too young compared with the Son. "One day," writes Condivi, "as I was talking to Michelangelo of this objection, 'Do you not know,' he said, 'that chaste women retain their fresh looks much longer than those who are not chaste? And I tell you, moreover, that such freshness and flower of youth, besides being maintained in her by natural causes, it may possibly be that it was ordained by the Divine Power to prove to the world the virginity and perpetual purity of the Mother. It was not necessary in the Son, but rather the contrary, wishing to show that the Son of God took upon himself a true human body subject to all the ills of man, excepting only sin. Do not wonder then that I have, for all these reasons, made the most Holy Virgin, Mother of God, a great deal younger in comparison with her Son than she is usually represented. To the Son I have allotted His full age.'" This grave theological statement gives us an interesting insight into Michelangelo's pious and meditative character, showing how earnestly he took his art and how reverently he thought out every detail, especially when interpreting some religious theme.

The figure of the dead Redeemer is, if possible, even more admirable than that of the Mother. "He is of so great and so rare a beauty," exclaims Condivi, "that no one beholds it but is moved to pity. A figure truly worthy of the humanity which belonged to the Son of God." No other sculptor has ever succeeded in giving marble the absolute abandon of death quite so pathetically as Michelangelo has done in this Dead Christ. Here it was that his profound knowledge of anatomy, and the long hours spent over the dissecting table at Santo Spirito, first stood him in good stead. In the Albertina Gallery at Vienna there is a magnificent study of a subject placed in almost exactly the same position as the Dead Christ, which the sculptor evidently transferred to The PietÃ , if indeed he did not make the sketch expressly for this group. Although Michelangelo always professed to be a sculptor and nothing else, he shows all a true painter's sensitive appreciation of light and shade in this work, having so arranged the graceful, but somewhat complicated folds of the Madonna's draperies, as to form a comparatively dark background which enhances the whiteness of the lifeless body lying on her lap.

To students of Michelangelo's art this work is especially interesting as it shows the master equally free from the influence of his Florentine predecessors, and from that of the antique. Michelangelo was conscious of the merit and of the originality of this group, for it is the only one which he considered worthy of bearing his great name.

THE PIETÃ€.

The David, now in the Accademia at Florence, inaugurates the series of Michelangelo's colossal statues. It will be remembered that the master undertook to utilize a huge block of marble already rough-hewn by an unskilful sculptor, and that he succeeded in hewing this magnificent statue, without adding any other piece at all, so exactly to the size that the old surface of the marble may still be seen on the top of the head and in the base. What most surprises the modern artist when studying not only this, but all Michelangelo's colossal works, both in painting and in sculpture, is the perfect finish of every detail. The fearless eyes, the shapely ear, the firm set mouth, the powerful hand nervously grasping the death-dealing missile, could not have been more carefully modelled in a statuette, and casts of each individual limb are still set before students to copy and admire in every studio of the world.

In 1501, when Michelangelo began this work, he was still free and unfettered, justly proud of the fame which his PietÃ had brought him, and with the world literally at his feet. This young giant boldly taking aim at an unknown but formidable enemy, might well be regarded as an allegorical representation of the artist himself, on the eve of grappling with his fate. It may be taken for certain that a quarter of a century later he would have interpreted the same theme very differently, and would perhaps have given us David the King, or David the Psalmist and the Prophet, instead of this magnificent embodiment of conscious power and hope. The fierce frown, the expression of strenuous force victoriously struggling against overwhelming odds, all those characteristics, in short, which have been summed up in the word terribilitÃ by his contemporaries, would have been replaced by the sombre majesty of the Moses, or the despairing expression of conquered, impotent strength which is the key-note to such works as the Medicean Tombs, the Louvre Captives, and the Last Judgment. Critics casting about for an artistic derivation of Michelangelo's earlier works maintain that the David's face bears a resemblance to the features of Donatello's Saint George in Or San Michele, but the type is far more virile and energetic, recalling, if anything, the masterpieces of ancient art.

The tondo representing The Holy Family, now in the Tribuna of the Uffizi, is doubly interesting as a work of art and as an instance of Michelangelo's fearless originality. It was painted about the year 1503 for that Florentine merchant prince, Angelo Doni, who sat for his portrait to the divine Raphael. Although Signorelli had once before introduced nude figures as a decorative element in a Madonna and Child which he painted for Lorenzo de' Medici (and it is possible that Michelangelo saw this picture), no other artist of the Renaissance had ever dared to interpret a sacred subject such as the Holy Family in so Pagan a spirit. An ancient Greek would quite naturally have supposed the beautiful group in the foreground to represent Juno playing with the infant Bacchus, only wondering, perhaps, why the artist had neglected to place a garland of vine leaves and clustering grapes round the Wine God's curly head. St. Joseph might easily be taken for a momentarily uxorious Jupiter or for a sober Silenus, and the nude shepherds idling in the background place the scene in a pleasant corner of Arcadia, while a grinning little Faun does duty for St. John the Baptist.

Nevertheless there is not the slightest hint at irreverence; it is merely a Pagan translation, by a master hand, of an oft-repeated Christian theme, a transposition as beautiful and as harmonious in its way as the original score. Indeed, Vasari tells us that Michelangelo painted this strikingly original tondo merely "to show his skill," and the magnificent modelling and foreshortening of the Madonna's arms, the masterful composition, and the wonderfully accurate drawing more than achieve his object. As to the colouring, he entirely disregarded it in his sculptor's pride. He might as well have carved this remarkable work in marble. Before painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, Michelangelo appeared to be wilfully colour-blind, as if afraid that painting would wile him away from the sister art, to which he had plighted his troth.

There is very little doubt that the original design of the Creation of Man was inspired in Michelangelo by one of the antique gems which he admired as a boy in Lorenzo de' Medici's collection. A similar origin may be assigned to the group of Judith and her maid, also in the Sistine Chapel, to several of the Athletes, and to the Leda and the Swan which he painted for the Duke of Ferrara. But this magnificent recumbent figure of Adam far surpasses anything in ancient as well as in modern art, and is indeed a worthy centre round which the remaining stupendous compositions appear to gravitate like planets round the sun. It is here, more than in any other of his works, that we can appreciate Michelangelo's wonderful gift of interpreting the highest and most inaccessible themes in a simple yet imposing manner. Resting heavily on the curved surface of the globe, his powerful limbs and finely modelled flesh clearly outlined against the indigo blue of the sky and the solemn lines of the landscape, Adam gives one the impression of a huge primeval being instinct with strength which he is as yet unable to understand or to use, and just awaking into life, a divine spark of which he receives from the Deity. Michelangelo's conception of God the Father, as an old but powerful and majestic figure, has ever since remained the only possible pictorial symbol of so lofty a subject.

THE HOLY FAMILY.

Apart from its great artistic merit, a pathetic interest attaches to the statue of Moses because it represents the last act of that tragedy of the tomb which darkened the greater part of Michelangelo's life, and influenced his art more than any other circumstance of his eventful career.

The leader and law-giver of the Hebrews is seated in an attitude of thought and wisdom, holding under his right arm the tables of the law, and supporting his chin with his left hand, like one tired and full of cares. His beard escapes in long waves between the fingers of his right hand. The hands and strong bare arms of the Moses are magnificent, beyond comparison the finest ever modelled by Michelangelo. The expression of the face is one of commanding power and almost fierce energy, a face capable of inspiring terror rather than love, a veritable embodiment of the cruel, uncompromising Hebrew legislation. The powerful, massive form is clearly apparent beneath the beautiful folds of the draperies, for here, as in all Michelangelo's clothed figures, whether in painting or in sculpture, dress does not hide but almost enhances the shape and beauty of the body. "This statue alone," exclaimed the Cardinal of Mantua, when he saw the finished work, "is enough to honour the memory of Pope Julius."

THE MOSES.

In the Medicean tombs Michelangelo may be said to have equalled if not surpassed the masterpieces of ancient sculpture. We have selected the tomb of Lorenzo de' Medici for our illustration, as the statues which adorn it, symbolizing Evening and Dawn, although conceived in the same spirit of profound melancholy, are, if possible, even more beautiful than the Day and Night of Giuliano's tomb. Evening is represented by an old man, brooding and dejected, but hardly less powerful and muscular than the giant Day. It is evident that he is not suffering from bodily fatigue, but that he is sinking under the weight of some unbearable, irremediable calamity.

The virgin Dawn is perhaps the most beautiful female figure of modern or of ancient art. She is represented as only half awake and almost unable to rise from her couch, while there is a suggestion of ineffable bitterness in the expression of the face with its half-closed eyes wearily greeting another day of sorrow. The powerful yet graceful limbs are magnificently modelled, and the whole figure may be regarded as the perfection of the female form, redeemed from any breath of sensuality by a commanding loftiness of expression, such as the Greeks gave to the statues of their goddesses.

Michelangelo's Last Judgment is a work of so colossal a nature that it would be impossible to give even a remote idea of the whole composition in this unpretentious little book. We have therefore selected for our illustration the central group representing Christ the Judge, a dread figure enthroned on clouds, with hand upraised in an attitude of stern command, surrounded by the Blessed, who press round the Son of God with eager, frightened looks and gestures, as if hardly secure of their final salvation in that terrible day of retribution, "cum vix Justus sit securus." Nestling timorously close to her Son, half sitting, half crouching, with head averted, as if to avoid seeing the coming wrath, and arms crossed on her bosom, is the Mother of God, a wonderfully sweet and pathetic figure, full of pity and sorrow for the condemned souls, and contrasting strangely with the inexorable Judge rising in his stern majesty to pronounce sentence on the frightened, shuddering mass of humanity. The action of the Judge, and indeed every part of the composition, forcibly remind us of the Last Judgment in the Campo Santo of Pisa, but there is not a figure or a detail in the whole of this colossal work which does not bear the imprint of that powerful originality and that wonderful gift to express the most varied emotion and to interpret the loftiest themes, which were the principal characteristics of Michelangelo's genius.