Research - Artist no.1: Michelangelo - a renowned genius

Michelangelo, one of the most renowned artist who isn't just an artist but also a writer and an architect as well. His genius pieces of painting and sculpture with his unique style made him recognised by contemporaries as a master. It is crucial for me to educate on how he created these art works using what kind of skills and how formal elements had an impact on his works.

Even though he was a genius, his lack of passion towards to painting compare to sculpture is unfortunate. However, while he was working on various subjects such as constructing tomb for Pope Julius the second or paintings in Sistine Chapel, for example, 'The Creation of Adam' or 'The Last Judgement', with his unique technique and spending immense amount of time, the value of these pieces were eminent. His countless figures in complex poses and its ebullient use of colour explains the main source of this particular style call "Mannerism".

[The Creation of Adam]

[The Last Judgement]

First of all, let's indicate what Mannerist style really is and how Michelangelo able to use this specific style to enhance his personal work back in 15th~16th century. I didn't really understand the meaning of mannerism so I had to research what this style is.

• Was found around late 15th century, artistic style - characterized by distortion of elements such as scales and perspective.
• This style sought to represent an ideal of beauty rather than natural images of it, using characteristic distortion and exaggeration of human proportions, perspective etc.
 

However, what I really need to find from this particular artist is which part of formal element he utilizes the most, how this specific element can be implemented and harmonaizes the painting. While working on educating myself about the techniques he used, it is also important to understand the benefit from learning this style.

'The Last Judgement'

With close attention to the painting, it was obvious that the Christ in top-mid section of the painting is the main point of this painting, where all the attention grasp into this one spot. As I thought that the usage of line and colour were outstands more than other formal elements, so I did some experiments using these elements on 'The Last Judgement'. The expectation is to find the technical side of this painting and what benefit I will receive at the end.

As I have said before, Christ is the focal point of this painting, as if there is a light, it radiates the entire area. For this painting, I have done some technical analysis of my version to know which part of element Michelangelo used the most. Hopefully at the end, the result should have the improvement on the painting by specifically using what Michelangelo used the most.

• Line works in this piece clearly indicates that the Christ, radiating out like a sun and creating differnet line works, such as verticle, horizantal and curved, at the same time. This dynamic perspective view is the key factor of this painting and will use it later in personal experiment piece.

• The colour usage: surprisingly, the environment wasn't the greatest part of this painting but the overwhelming amount of blue harmonizes well with the rest of the painting.

• Unfortuantely, Michelangelo was specialised in sculpture due to the fact that he studied on human anatomy and able to tell the muscle movement and the reaction of human physiology. This particular study gave him more insight of 3 dimensional 'form' and able to create stunning sculptures. This study of his also gave him huge boost towards to his painting, giving him the ability to create dynamic form of character.

Source:

• http://www.michelangelo-gallery.com/paintings.aspx