Posted on 06/17/2005 10:53:03 AM PDT by NYer
Two Brazilian doctors and amateur art lovers believe they have uncovered a secret lesson on human anatomy hidden by Michelangelo in the Sistine Chapel's ceiling.
Completed almost 500 years ago, the brightly coloured frescoes painted on the Vatican's famous sanctuary are considered some of the world's greatest works of art.
They depict biblical scenes such as the Creation of Adam in which God reaches out to touch Adam's finger.
But Gilson Barreto and Marcelo de Oliveira say in their book The Secret Art of Michelangelo that the artist also scattered his detailed knowledge of internal anatomy across 34 of the ceiling's 38 panels. They say a tree trunk is not just a tree trunk, but also a bronchial tube. And a green bag in one scene is really a human heart.
The key to finding the numerous organs, bones and other human parts is to first crack a code they believe was left behind by the Florentine artist. Essentially, it is a set of sometimes subtle, sometimes overt clues, like the way a figure is pointing.
"Why wasn't this ever seen before? First, because very few people have the sufficient anatomical knowledge to see these pieces like this," said Dr Barreto, a surgeon in the Brazilian city of Campinas.
Dr Barreto and his friend Dr Oliveira are not the first physicians to see depictions of human organs in the Sistine Chapel.
Fifteen years ago Frank Meshberger, an American, pointed out that the figure of God and his surrounding angels in the Creation of Adam panel resembled a cross-section of the human brain.
Dr Barreto came across Dr Meshberger's theory when packing up to move house, and decided that if there was a brain there had to be other organs.
He searched through books and pictures of the chapel and found five or six other anatomical depictions which he showed Dr Oliveira.
The pair then spent the next three months looking for further evidence.
They discovered another US doctor, Garabed Eknoyan, had found the figure of a kidney in the panel titled Separation of the Earth from the Waters.
The pair came to believe Michelangelo had put coded messages in each panel to help viewers find the hidden body part.
Some clues are thematic, such as Creation of Adam or Creation of Eve, in which a tree trunk looks like a bronchial tube and God's purple robe is a representation of a lung when seen from the side. One could say God was imparting the "breath of life" into Eve in the scene, Dr Barreto said.
In the scene Cumaean Sibyl a bag with a red frilly border and white rolled up scrolls inside hanging beside the Sibyl was a depiction of a heart, the diaphragm and the aorta, the doctors said.
Faced with the paintings and photographs of the anatomical body part side-by-side, the theory is conceivable, although some matches require a a bit of creativity.
Dennis Geronimus, a specialist on Renaissance art at New York University who examined some of Dr Barreto's and Dr Oliveira's "decoded" matches, said: "The problem, and art historians too are certainly often guilty of this, is simply that we often see what we want to see."
I believe this one is in your department.
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bump for later...
What do you all think about this guy's hypothesis?
He couldn't have known that much about anatomy. His Adam has a navel.........and his DAVID isn't quite Jewish enough.....
If they dig a little deeper they're gonna find out that Botticeli had that whole Cold Fusion thing licked. His solution is right there in the "Birth of Venus" -- if you know where to look.
Very interesting. Gives a whole new dimension to the Sistine Chapel. As someone who paints, I can attest that artists draw inspiration from very diverse sources, and I wouldn't be in one bit surprised if Michaelangelo did indeed incorporate aspects of internal anatomy into his frescoes.
LOL!
Seems like a stretch to me.
Haven't read it yet, but
Art ping!
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Me too.
Okay, where are the naughty bits?
The genius of Michelangelo is apparent in his depiction of the human anatomy.
Michelangelo was consumed with depicting realistic human anatomy----which he studied religiously, especially corpses.
Michelangelo concentrated on studying anatomy in order to be able to paint, and sculpt, characters whose bodies and musculature looked real.
Underlying musculature which gives Michelangelo's sculptures and paintings power and realism is rarely found in lesser artists works.
Some critics have said that Michelangelo's figures express "action barely restrained," that this powerful visual tension was accomplished by the use of the contraposito.
The use of contraposito dictates that "whatever action a figure is engaged in, its trunk will always appear twisted, so that if the right arm is extended forward or makes any other gesture designed by the artist, the left side of the body shall withdraw."
Michelangelo encouraged his students to "always make a figure pyramidal ... and serpentine formed."
For this reason, "one sees in Michelangelo's paintings the most difficult movements...tending toward a certain savagery and terribility."
Some argued that Michelangelo "deliberately chose contorted and convulsed movements."
Michelangelo's use of contraposito was consonant with the overarching religiously-inspired view that painters should express the soul with bodily movements rather than with expressions.
The use of contraposito contributed to the searing visual effect of Michelangelo's figures.
Fascinating. Renaissance artists often attended human dissections and had an extensive knowledge of anatomy.
I heard this guy's hypothesis some years ago and bring it into my classes all the time. Actually, Mesberger's ideas go further because his hypothesis is that God is not giving life to Adam (because he really looks alive, just a bit lethargic); his idea is that he is giving Adam intelligence, from the brain in which he soars. Awesome idea. Sometimes art historians dismiss ideas like this because Mesberger is not a PhD art historian. All the better. I know nothing about organs. I love the two images in this thread thus far and have copied them for future use in my classes. (As an artist/art historian, I love as many sources for ideas as possible).
I think this is a fascinating hypothesis, and as one artist poster noted, artists take inspiration from a variety of sources. Also, this is the first time that bodies were being dissected. I think da Vinci got into trouble for dissection of corpses. So maybe this is also another way of showing what the organs look like (for those unwilling or unable to do the dirty work).
Tell me more; show me more organs and their corresponding images on the ceiling.
Michelangelo Creation of Adam, Creation of the Sun and Moon, and Creation of Eve 1508-10
Here are the naughty bits. Have we ever seen God's rearend before? Much less such a tight one? (We can see what parts of the body Michelangelo loved.)
A few interesting tidbits about the Temptation and Expulsion, above. Notice the awesome use of color on the irridescent snake (even in this mediocre reproduction). Some say that Michelangelo was no colorist; I beg to differ and offer the snake as proof.
Also, notice how beautiful Eve is on the left, especially compared to her more primitive "just born" above or the sinner's grief on the right in the same image. Also, notice how close she is to "intimate carnal knowledge of Adam" as one teacher of mine one referred to it. (I used to refer to Monica Lewinsky in class, but my students are too young now, and too liberal, to be amused.) Also, note how incredibly muscular Eve is. Many women would kill for a rearend that muscular. It was controversial at that time to draw from the nude female model, so Michelangelo would just add a couple of breasts onto the male models. In the image below from his later Medici Chapel in Florence, the 6" between breasts is rather unnatural.
Again, this lady's rear end looks rather good for having had many children.
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