Friday, July 22, 2011

selfdom

    I am engaged writing about one of our painters.But in between images of Michelangelo paintings and sculptures  rushed in.
So feel like  quoting a few sentences  from  the book  'The Lives Of The Artists' written by one of foremost art historians of the 16th century, Giorgio Vasari'
about the great sculpture Pieta  by Michelangelo

"No sculptor, not even the most rare artist, could ever reach this level of design and grace, nor could he even with hard work, ever finish, polish and cut marble as skilfully as Michelangelo did here, for in this statue all of the worth and power of sculpture is revealed.....Michelangelo placed so much love and labour in this work that on it he left his name written across a sash which grids Our Lady's breast. This came about because one day when Michaelangelo was entering the church where the statue was placed, he found a large number of foreigners from Lombardy who were praising the statue highly: one of them asked another who had sculpted it, and he replied:'our Gobbo from Milan'.( Cristoforo Solari- 1460-1527). Michelangelo stood there silently, and it seemed somewhat strange to him that his labours were being attributed to someone else; one night he locked himself inside the church with little light , and having brought his chisels, he carved his name upon the statue. And it has such qualities that a very fine mind has described it as a true and like figure:




Beauty and goodness,
and grief and pity,
alive in dead marble,
do not , as you do, Weep loudly,
Lest too early He should reawaken from death....
.............................................."

2 comments:

Arjun Bhaskaran said...

He is one of my fav. one. a great creater of glass &wall paintings and sculptures,.Thanks alot for sharing

savi said...

No glass paintings but frescoes and Marble sculptures.Thanks.