The Sistine Chapel
31 Mar, 2022
700 Arts
Melvyn Bragg and guests discuss the astonishing work of Michelangelo (1477-1564) in this great chapel in the Vatican, firstly the ceiling with images from Genesis (of which the image above is a detail) and later The Last Judgement on the altar wall. For the Papacy, Michelangelo’s achievement was a bold affirmation of the spiritual and political status of the Vatican, of Rome and of the Catholic Church. For the artist himself, already famous as the sculptor of David in Florence, it was a test of his skill and stamina, and of the potential for art to amaze which he realised in his astonishing mastery of the human form.
Guests
- Catherine Fletcher
3 episodes
Professor of History at Manchester Metropolitan University -
Sarah Vowles No other episodes
The Smirnov Family Curator of Italian and French Prints and Drawings at the British Museum -
Matthias Wivel No other episodes
The Aud Jebsen Curator of Sixteenth-Century Italian Paintings at the National Gallery
Reading list
-
Michelangelo Drawings: Closer to the Master
Hugo Chapman (British Museum Press, 2006) Google Books → -
Michelangelo: His Epic Life
Martin Gayford (Fig Tree, 2017) Google Books → -
Michelangelo: The Achievement of Fame
Michael Hirst (Yale University Press, 2011) Google Books → -
Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling
Ross King (Chatto & Windus, 2002) Google Books → -
Michelangelo: The Sistine Chapel Ceiling
Charles Seymour Jr (ed.) (Thames & Hudson, 1972) Google Books → -
Julius II: The Warrior Pope
Christine Shaw (Wiley-Blackwell, 1993) Google Books → -
Michelangelo: The Artist, the Man and his Times
William E. Wallace (Cambridge University Press, 2011) Google Books → -
Michelangelo: Six Lectures
Johannes Wilde (Oxford University Press, 1978) Google Books →
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Programme ID: m0015vh8
Episode page: bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0015vh8
Auto-category: 709.2 (Renaissance art)