Michael Angelo now executed a Madonna in bronze, and copied the
wonderful frescos of Masaccio in the Brancacci Chapel of Santa Maria del
Carmine (usually called the Carmine Chapel), the same which inspired
Fra Angelico, Raphael, and Andrea del Sarto. "The importance of these
frescos arises from the fact that they hold the same place in the
history of art during the fifteenth century as the works of Giotto, in
the Arena Chapel at Padua, hold during the fourteenth. Each series forms
an epoch in painting, from which may be dated one of those great and
sudden onward steps which have in various ages and countries marked the
development of art. The history of Italian painting is divided into
three distinct and well-defined periods, by the Arena and Brancacci
Chapels, and the frescos of Michael Angelo and Raphael in the Vatican."
While Michael Angelo was copying these paintings of Masaccio, he took no
holidays, and gave the hours of night to his labors. Ambition made work
a delight. He studied anatomy like a devotee. Dead bodies were conveyed
from the hospital to a cell in the convent of Santo Spirito, the artist
rewarding the prior by a crucifix almost as large as life, which he
carved from wood.
The youth could but know his superiority to others, and was not always
wise enough to conceal his contempt for mediocrity, or for the young men
who played at life. One of his fellow-students, Torrigiani, grew so
angry at him, probably from some slighting remark, that he struck him
with his fist, disfiguring his face for life. Michael Angelo is said to
have merely replied to this brutal assault, "You will be remembered only
as the man who broke my nose." Torrigiani was at once banished, and
died miserably in the Spanish Inquisition.
In April, 1492, Lorenzo the Magnificent died, in the very prime of his
life. Michael Angelo was so overcome that for a long time he was unable
to collect his thoughts for work. The self-reliant young man, cold
outwardly, had a warm and generous heart.
He went home to the Buonarotti mansion, opened a studio, purchased a
piece of marble and made a Hercules four feet in height. It stood for
many years in the Strozzi Palace in Florence, was sold to France, and is
now lost.
Piero de' Medici succeeded to his father Lorenzo, who is said to have
remarked that "he had three sons: the first good, the second clever, the
third a fool. The good one was Giuliano, thirteen years old at the death
of his father; the clever one was Giovanni, seventeen years old, but a
cardinal already by favor of the pope, whose son had married a daughter
of Lorenzo's; and the fool was Piero."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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