Essay’s Controlling Sentence (Thesis): During his reign, Pope Julius II commissioned Michelangelo to do many difficult projects.
A. When did they meet? 1505 A.D.
B. Where did they meet? In Rome. Michelangelo had to come from Florence.
C. Why did they meet? Pope Julius wanted Michelangelo to begin work on the Pope’s tomb.
D. What did the tomb look like? Tomb was supposed to have forty marble statues of various Biblical figures. Tomb was supposed to be thirty-four feet long and twenty-three feet wide, with Michelangelo’s sculptures set into insets lining the walls (Alexander 110-111).
II. The Pope’s Statue
A. What happened after he met the Pope? Michelangelo goes back to Florence and starts to work.
B. What happened after he met the Pope? He’s called back to Rome “with a rope around my neck” to make a fourteen foot bronze statue of the Pope (Alexander 115).
C. What happened to the statue? Statue is completed in 1508 but is later melted it down to make a cannon.
III. Beginning of the Sistine Chapel Assignment
A. How did Sistine Chapel assignment come about? Since 1506, Julius has thought of having Sistine Chapel replastered. In 1508, he decided to do it.
B. How did Michelangelo get involved? Pope wanted Michelangelo to fresco the vault;
C. What did Chapel look like? Huge vault (one hundred twenty feet in length, forty-five feet in width, and sixty-eight feet in height). Had been previously frescoed by Pier Matteo d’Amelia (Schurman 339).
D. How did Michelangelo react to the assignment? He did not think of himself a painter. He told the Pope that “the place is wrong and no painter I” (Baker 68).
E. Why did he take the assignment? Pope threatened to banish him from Rome.
F. When did he start his work? In 1508, with advance payment and a crew of six helpers (Canady 74).
IV. The Long Years at the Sistine Chapel
A. How did he work? Alone. (He dismissed his helpers because they could not paint to the perfection that he demanded.)
B. What did he paint? Started over the entranceway with Flood of Noah and to finished up with scenes from Genesis over the altar wall. (Baldini and Savini 215)
C. How did he paint? He made rough sketches of these designs in red chalk. Then, from the drawings, he painted the frescos, most of which were of nudes or of revealingly robed individuals (Rosand 50).
D. What was the work like? He slept many nights upon the scaffolding so as not to have to make the long climb up and down it each day.
E. How long did he paint? For two years, after which he took a brief intermission while the scaffolding was taken down and moved to the other half of the vault. As soon as the scaffolding was set up again, he continued to paint for another two years; and when he was finished, he had painted 343 life-sized figures (Schurman 339).
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