biography
| name: |
Michelangelo
|
| |
in full Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni
|
pronunciation:
[miyklanjeloh]
| sex:
| male
|
| lived:
| (1475–1564)
|
| biography:
| Sculptor, painter, and poet, born in Caprese, NC Italy. As a boy he was placed in the care of a stonemason at Settignano, and in 1488 spent three years in Florence with Ghirlandaio. He received the patronage of Lorenzo de' Medici, and after his death (1492) spent three years in Bologna. His ‘Cupid’ was bought by Cardinal San Giorgio, who summoned him to Rome (1496), where he stayed for four years. He then returned to Florence, where he sculpted the marble ‘David’. Though he did not wholly neglect painting, his genius was essentially plastic, and he was far more interested in form than in colour. In 1503 Julius II summoned him back to Rome, where he was commissioned to design the pope's tomb; but interruptions and quarrels left him able to complete only a fragment. Instead, he was ordered to decorate the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel with paintings, which he did with reluctance (1508–12). In 1528 danger to Florence forced him to the science of fortification, and when the city was besieged (1529) he was foremost in its defence. His last pictorial achievement was ‘The Last Judgement’ (1537), and the next year he was appointed architect of St Peter's, to which he devoted himself until his death. |
|
|
