From the June 2024 issue of Apollo. Preview and subscribe here . Visitors to ‘the last decades’ come directly face to face with the master.
A portrait drawing of Michelangelo by his acolyte and intimate friend Daniele da Volterra is the first work displayed. The drawing, made when Michelangelo was in his mid to late 70s, is a cartoon. It was pricked for transfer to paint the mural of the Assumption of the Virgin in the Della Rovere Chapel in the Roman church of Santissima Trinità dei Monti.
In that picture, Michelangelo is at the (viewer’s) far right, among the apostles. His contemplative gaze is directed outwards. His right arm directs the beholder’s eyes towards the Virgin rising to heaven.
The inclusion testifies to Michelangelo’s stature – ‘divine’ was an adjective used to describe him and his work – and the gesture to his devotional ardour. These and other aspects of his complex character are explored here through a compelling selection of his drawings and letters, poems in draft and polished form and prints and paintings after his designs, in an exhibition that charts the last third of his career. Daniele was among those with Michelangelo when he died on 18 February 1564.
He had written to the artist’s nephew and heir four days before, begging him to hasten from Florence to Rome. The letter, signed by Michelangelo with cramped and sloping hand, is among the last exhibits, a poignant testimony to Michelangelo’s failing, yet ever tenacious, grasp o.
