Sculptures By Michelangelo

By peace | September 16, 2010

Sculpture of a Slave (Atlas)

Michelangelo believed that a sculptor should find the shape hidden inside a block of stone. To do this Michelangelo sculpted in an unusual way. Instead of working from all sides, as was usual, he carved from front to back. His unfinished Slave, also known as Atlas — for the tomb of Pope Julius II, shows this method of carving. It is thought that he started it in 1520s. He never completed it.

Only 4 months later, Pope Julius died. The time had now arrived for Michelangelo to build his tomb. Though it had been four years since he had worked at sculpture, Michelangelo had been storing up ideas. While he was covering the Sistine ceiling with hundreds of marvelous figures in many dramatic poses, he imagined them in three dimensions. Now he would render them in marble.

He began by carving two captive slaves. They were meant to symbolize the arts, which at the death of Julius would lose their greatest patron and thus become “prisoners of death”. With these two beautiful sculptures, Michelangelo had moved beyond mere perfection in anatomy. The figures seem to move and breathe, twisting dramatically, the legs turning in one direction, the torsos in another. This technique, used by the Greeks, is called contrapposto.

Next, he made a seated Moses, so fierce and powerful, so full of energy, you half expect him to leap up from his throne and speak. He, too, was born in the Sistine Chapel, for he could easily be one of those massive prophets who had somehow managed to step off the ceiling and been magically turned to stone.