Blog # 5

David with the head of Goliath, Caravaggio

Caravaggio only lived a short life of 37 years, a life full of riot, instability and flight. Though many artists are considered eccetric, very few are as temperamental, impulsive and violent as him. His crime records included injury, insult, and even murder. However, he is indeed a genius. Not only an unusually gifted genius, but one I deeply admired. But how could I admire a villain? I was totally bewildered.
Michelangelo's David is an ideal youth with divine qualities and full of inner strength. Bernini's David is mature and energetic. Unlike them, Caravaggio's David doesn't look heroic. He doesn't seem very happy about his victory, but disgusted. Why could he have that kind of expression toward his giant enemy- the image of Caravaggio's self-portrait? Why an artist identified himself with Goliath? Michelangelo has painted his distored feature as the flayed skin of Bartholomew in his " Last Judgement". But Bartholomew was a saint and was going to be accepted into heaven . Unlike the saved soul of Bartholomew, Goliath was condemned.
Caravaggio's tragic life is like a deep sigh. He was revolutionary and seemed opposed to every rule- the traditions of painting, the law, the authority of prison(once he escaped from a prison), and the assumed role of an artist. Giving viewers a sense of beauty or an idealized world was not his intention. He refused to model the classical sculptures and took models from the street. He broke the boundaries of saints and common people, the noble and the lowly, ideal and realistic as well. During those years of committing crimes, imprisoning and fleeing, he must knew very well about the darkness of human nature, the desperate situation of mankind, and the terror and despair of being isolated. He pushed us from the surface appearance of the world to the reality of ourselves.
Is his David , neither perfect nor triumphal, also himself?
Caravaggio finally got clemency from Rome. Three days after his death, it arrived.

Blog # 4 Pieta By Michelangelo

When Michelangelo made his first Pieta, he was in his early twenties. This life-size marble sculpture depicted Virgin Mary as a beautiful young woman, almost as young as her son. Mary is serene and contemplative, while Jesus seems in peaceful sleep.
I was puzzled when I first came upon Michelangelo's interpretation of Pieta. It conveys a sense of tranquility instead of grievance. I am not sure if Michelangelo intended to create a heavenly atmosphere.

Florentine Pieta
Fifty years passed when Micholangelo worked on this theme again. He was in his seventies now. Jesus looks like completely lifeless so they are struggling to support his body. From my own experience on medical care, I know human bodies will become much heavier when we are unconscious. Michelangelo has greatly changed his style. His Pieta is no longer an ideal form, but reveals the sense of death.


Michelangelo was eighty years old when he began
working on his last two Pieta. He worked on them intermittently for the follwoing ten years. He seems to be getting further away from his youthful work. He no longer demonstrated his perfect and mastery technique.
He left them rough and unfinished, intentionally. The


blocks of marble speak for themselves. He did not persue the goal of perfection , but the essence of art and life. His figures of the last Pieta seemed to merge together, which might revealed his ultimate yearning for the destination of life.