by Dr Ross King (Author)
In 1508, Pope Julius II commissioned Michelangelo to paint the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. The thirty-three-year-old Michelangelo had very little experience of the physically and technically taxing art of fresco; and, at twelve thousand square feet, the ceiling represented one of the largest such projects ever attempted. Nevertheless, for the next four years he and a hand-picked team of assistants laboured over the vast ceiling, making thousands of drawings and spending back-breaking hours on a scaffold fifty feet above the floor. The result was one of the greatest masterpieces of all time. This fascinating book tells the story of those four extraordinary years and paints a magnificent picture of day-to-day life on the Sistine scaffolding - and outside, in the upheaval of early sixteenth-century Rome.
Format: Paperback
Pages: 384
Edition: New edition
Publisher: Pimlico
Published: 06 Apr 2006
ISBN 10: 1844139328
ISBN 13: 9781844139323
Book Overview: The extraordinary story behind Michelangelo's masterpiece by the author of Brunelleschi's Dome.