Biography of Miguel Angel | Sculptor, painter and architect.

(Miguel Angel Buonarrotti, in Italian Michelangelo; Caprese, current Italy, 1475 - Rome, 1564) sculptor, painter and Italian architect. Miguel Ángel as the great figure of the Italian Renaissance, is usually recognized a man whose exceptional artistic personality dominated the creative landscape of the 16th century and whose figure is based on the conception of the artist as a unique being, that widely surpasses the ordinary conventions.

Michelangelo Buonarrotti

During the nearly seventy years lasting career, Miguel Ángel cultivated equally painting, sculpture and architecture, with extraordinary results in each of these artistic facets. His contemporaries saw in the realizations of Miguel Ángel an attribute, called terribilitá, to which the greatness of his genius; can be attributed This term refers to aspects such as physical strength, emotional intensity and creative enthusiasm, real constants in the works by this artist conferred them upon his greatness and inimitable personality.

The life of Miguel Ángel was spent between Florence and Rome, cities that left his masterpieces. He learned in the workshop of Ghirlandaio painting and sculpture in the garden of the Medici, who had gathered an exceptional collection of antique statues. He took his first steps making copies of frescoes of Giotto or Masaccio that served to define his style.

Michelangelo Pieta (c. 1499)

In 1496 he moved to Rome, where he made two sculptures that projected him to fame: the Bacchus and the piety of San Pedro. The latter, his masterpiece of the early years, is a sculpture of great beauty and a flawless finish that reflects his technical mastery. After five years he returned to Florence, where he received several commissions, including David, naked young four meters high which represents the perfect beauty and synthesises the values of Renaissance humanism.

Detail of David (1504), by Michelangelo

In 1505, when he was working in preparatory carton (unfinished) battle of Cascina for the Palazzo Vecchio, the Pope Julio II summoned him to Rome so he sculpted his tomb; Miguel Ángel worked on this work until 1545 and ended only three statues, Moses and two slaves; left half several statues of slaves that are currently among its accomplishments more admired, allowing you to appreciate how extracted literally blocks of marble figures that seemed to be already contained in them.

Julius II also asked it to decorate the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, commissioned Miguel Ángel refused to accept, since is considered primarily a sculptor, but which finally became its most sublime creation. Around the Central scenes, depicting episodes from Genesis, unfolds a series of prophets, sibyls and young naked, in a unitary whole dominated by two essential qualities: physical beauty and dynamic energy.

The creation (Chapel Sistine, 1508-1512)

In 1516 he returned to Florence to take care of the façade of San Lorenzo, work that gave him headaches and finally not held; but the artist projected for San Lorenzo two masterpieces: the Laurentian library and Chapel Medicea or new sacristy. Both achievements are heirs to the works of Brunelleschi, in the architectural appearance although the singular staircase to the library, able to create a particular effect of monumentality in the little gap, can only be work of the genius of Miguel Ángel. The Medicea Chapel houses two tombs containing the statue of the deceased and the master figures of the day, night, dawn and twilight.

In 1534, Miguel Ángel settled permanently in Rome, where took place the fresco of the last judgement in the Sistine Chapel and oversaw the works of the basilica of San Pedro, which substantially modified the plans and designed the dome, which is his work. Its another great architectural accomplishment was the completion of the Farnese Palace, begun by Sangallo the younger.

Extracted from the website: Biografías y Vidas