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Speaker 1: On this episode of Newts World. As many of you know,

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Speaker 1: I spent three and a half years living in Rome

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Speaker 1: while Callista served as ambassador to the Holy See. In

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Speaker 1: our time there, we met so many fascinating people, some

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Speaker 1: of whom were American expatriots who now live in Rome

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Speaker 1: full time. My guest today is somebody who had introduced

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Speaker 1: us to Rome many years ago, a very close personal

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Speaker 1: friend and a brilliant person. Elizabeth Love, or Liz as

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Speaker 1: we call her. She is someone we got to know

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Speaker 1: long before we got to Rome. Officially, she's an art historian.

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Speaker 1: She has an amazing ted talk on the Sistine Chapel.

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Speaker 1: She's been working as a guide in Rome for over

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Speaker 1: twenty years and I recommend her very highly. And she

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Speaker 1: teaches at Duquanne University's Italian campus as well as the

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Speaker 1: Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas. She is just a

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Speaker 1: remarkable teacher who is great fun, has great energy, has

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Speaker 1: a ton of ideas, and she's currently teaching a course

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Speaker 1: on the Sistine Chapel. And when she told me that,

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Speaker 1: I begged her to join us for this conversation to

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Speaker 1: talk about our mutual love of Rome. It's our history,

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Speaker 1: cuisine and people and encourage all of our listeners. If

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Speaker 1: you haven't been to Rome, add it to your bucket list.

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Speaker 1: It is an unbelievable city. Liz, welcome and thank you

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Speaker 1: for joining me on news World.

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Speaker 2: Thank you so much for having me and for inviting

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Speaker 2: me to talk about my favorite subject.

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Speaker 1: Well and as I understand that you are on a

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Speaker 1: tour today.

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Speaker 3: Yes, I was.

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Speaker 1: What is that like? You must have occasional stories about

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Speaker 1: the tours that you lead.

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Speaker 2: I think after twenty years of tours, I think these

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Speaker 2: stories of touring are what you might describe as legion.

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Speaker 2: Today I was taking around a group of priests. There

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Speaker 2: are very few things as fun as taking around a

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Speaker 2: group of priests because it allows us to talk about

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Speaker 2: the secondary and the tertiary levels of understanding. So instead

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Speaker 2: of having to stop and explain there's a guy named Jesus,

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Speaker 2: instead we can really start playing around with deeper meanings

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Speaker 2: and what things might mean and how we could maybe

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Speaker 2: have different prisms of how to look at the Sistine Chapel.

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Speaker 2: So that was a very lovely experience. But then being

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Speaker 2: the person to take a young person to the Sistine

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Speaker 2: Chapel for the very first time, is another. It's an

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Speaker 2: extraordinary honor and privilege because it's that moment, that really

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Speaker 2: rare and special moment of seeing eyes open as they

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Speaker 2: look at this work of art and it speaks to them.

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Speaker 2: So there are so many wonderful things that have happened

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Speaker 2: in my really fun job. It's just a wealth of

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Speaker 2: happy memories.

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Speaker 1: So you've got a degrief in the University of Chicago,

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Speaker 1: then came to Bologna do graduate work there, and I

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Speaker 1: gather you fell in love with Italy and couldn't leave.

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Speaker 3: Yes, they'll know with Italy, It's true.

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Speaker 2: I always loved Europe and I loved France, and then

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Speaker 2: later in Italy I think sort of swept me off

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Speaker 2: my feet. So I was always very interested in Europe.

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Speaker 2: It just goes back to reading a lot of European

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Speaker 2: based novels when I was young. But the real seduction

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Speaker 2: for me for Italy was the way that I was

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Speaker 2: taught to study art in the graduate program at the

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Speaker 2: University of Bologna, which was very different from the graduate

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Speaker 2: program at University of Chicago. The University of Chicago had

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Speaker 2: a very formal analysis, which means that everything in how

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Speaker 2: the work presents itself visually is what we talk about.

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Speaker 2: So we're kind of dissecting where the idea for a

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Speaker 2: certain figure, a composition, a use of color comes from.

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Speaker 2: Whereas the School of Bologna was very interested in what

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Speaker 2: wine people would call the terroire of a work of art,

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Speaker 2: So what is the soil that produces it, what are

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Speaker 2: people reading, what are people thinking about, what is happening

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Speaker 2: in the societie, and that that will produce a work

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Speaker 2: of art that is unique to the place where it's found.

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Speaker 2: And that particular methodology when eventually I came to Rome

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Speaker 2: and started doing tours and began to think in terms of, okay,

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Speaker 2: what is the soil of the Cistine Chapel, to begin

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Speaker 2: to realize how rich that soil was. It gave me

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Speaker 2: the possibility of seeing the Sistine Chapel in a way

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Speaker 2: that I was never able to see it to the

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Speaker 2: purely formal approach of the University of Chicago, and that

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Speaker 2: eye opening experience kind of like a drug. I really

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Speaker 2: I wanted to be here where this way of thinking

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Speaker 2: about art was something that would not be looked down

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Speaker 2: upon by academia, but was actually considered a very serious

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Speaker 2: strain of academic approach.

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Speaker 1: As I understand it, when you came down to finishing

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Speaker 1: your thesis, which was on the Church of San Giovanni

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Speaker 1: and Petronio in Rome, suddenly you realized you had to

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Speaker 1: live in Rome, that you couldn't be you if you

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Speaker 1: weren't in Rome.

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Speaker 2: Explain that, I quote that line of Queen Christina of Sweden,

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Speaker 2: it couldn't live another day if I didn't live it

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Speaker 2: in Rome, which is funny because my first impression of

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Speaker 2: Rome when I first went to Bologna back in nineteen

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Speaker 2: eighty seven or so, I came to Rome and I

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Speaker 2: thought it was a filthy, dirty, horrible city. And I

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Speaker 2: remember getting on the train to go back to Bologna

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Speaker 2: and saying, Oh, good heavens, I hope I never have

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Speaker 2: to go back to that place. But then after I

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Speaker 2: returned and my thesis topic brought me back to Rome

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Speaker 2: and came down frequently to use the libraries and the archives,

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Speaker 2: and the amazing feeling if I'd be reading something in

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Speaker 2: the archive and then I would think, hey, I could

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Speaker 2: just walk down the street and go see it. And

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Speaker 2: this immediacy, that sense of being so much closer to

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Speaker 2: the time and the age and the era and the

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Speaker 2: people who produced these works of art. Again, it was addictive.

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Speaker 2: I wanted to be here where I can read about

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Speaker 2: Bernini and then two minutes later I can go see him.

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Speaker 2: I can see Caravajo's work and Karachi's work, and I

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Speaker 2: can see their teams and their rivalries around the city.

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Speaker 2: You can't substitute it elsewhere. It's something about on site

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Speaker 2: study really is an advantage.

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Speaker 1: I have to say, as a historian who was deeply

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Speaker 1: interested in Imperial Rome. Every time I walk the street

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Speaker 1: so I have this chilling feeling of being a part

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Speaker 1: of history in a way that I can't think of

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Speaker 1: any other city that quite has that density of historic experience.

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Speaker 3: I agree with you entirely.

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Speaker 2: It's part of history and the way history seems to

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Speaker 2: flow through you. So you are part of this huge

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Speaker 2: stream of history. It goes back to this origin of

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Speaker 2: this city. It goes beyond me and what will happen

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Speaker 2: in the future, and it's being part of this very

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Speaker 2: intense and alive current of something that grows and continues,

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Speaker 2: and it gives you a real sense of belonging, which

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Speaker 2: is a unique, very very beautiful feeling.

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Speaker 1: So many of our listeners may get excited by this

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Speaker 1: and decide to go to Rome. In your judgment, what

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Speaker 1: are the top two or three things they should absolutely

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Speaker 1: make sure that they see or do well.

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Speaker 2: I think if you're coming to Rome for the first time,

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Speaker 2: you really must see the ancient city. You must see

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Speaker 2: the remains of the ancient city.

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Speaker 3: A lot of.

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Speaker 2: Things make sense to you. The way that the Romans

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Speaker 2: organized this ancient city with their religious access, their socioeconomic access.

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Speaker 2: The way the city changed is these different forms of

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Speaker 2: government changed. The haunting image of the Colisseum. The sheer

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Speaker 2: size people can describe it to you. But when you're

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Speaker 2: standing outside the Colosseum, which is two thousand years old,

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Speaker 2: and you just see how big and monumental it is,

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Speaker 2: and you think about a people who built to leave

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Speaker 2: their mark on eternity. It's an essential part of understanding Rome.

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Speaker 2: And from there you see the shift into the world

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Speaker 2: of the Vatican or Saint Peter's and the Sistine Chapel

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Speaker 2: and the Vatican muse But it's amazing how that world

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Speaker 2: that Roman Empire will morph. It will eventually the Renaissance

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Speaker 2: will pick up those fallen pieces of the Roman Empire

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Speaker 2: and create their own monumentality, which you see in Saint

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Speaker 2: Peter's Basilica, which is a unique, absolutely amazing church. Annexed

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Speaker 2: to it is this chapel, this repository of some of

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Speaker 2: the greatest painting the world has ever seen in the

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Speaker 2: Sistine Chapel, and then annexed to that are the papal

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Speaker 2: apartments painted by Raphael. It really is almost too much

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Speaker 2: if you're giving me three sites. The third is my

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Speaker 2: favorite place to go when you just want to calm down,

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Speaker 2: just like the cardinals did once upon a time, they

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Speaker 2: would head out onto the Pinchin Hill to visit the

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Speaker 2: beautiful villa of Chiapioni Borghese, and they're in that gallery

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Speaker 2: with the sculptures of Bernini and the paintings of Raphael and.

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Speaker 3: Caravaggo and Titian.

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Speaker 2: That is a place of osio, of leisure, of joyful relaxation.

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Speaker 1: Well, and I have to throw in from my more

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Speaker 1: childish side. It also has a really fine zoo right

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Speaker 1: down the street from the Borghese. The Borghesi, to me

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Speaker 1: is one of the most astonishingly beautiful collections in the world. Obviously,

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Speaker 1: the Vatican Museum is massively bigger and has stunning things,

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Speaker 1: but the Brighese has a kind of delicate beauty to

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Speaker 1: it that I find endlessly appealing.

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Speaker 2: It also is beautiful because of its reflection of basically

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Speaker 2: it's one person's taste. That maybe the building itself has

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Speaker 2: changed slightly in the eighteenth century, but the amassing of

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Speaker 2: the original works is the reflection of one man who

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Speaker 2: had the vision and had.

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Speaker 3: The power to do this.

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Speaker 2: And Cardinalship you one Borghese's taste in his sensitivity to art,

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Speaker 2: heralds this brand new period, which is the age of

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Speaker 2: the Baroque. So you see through the work of a patron,

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Speaker 2: through these genius artists, in this creation of a whole

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Speaker 2: new style happening in one space. It's like being in

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Speaker 2: the ultimate laboratory of art.

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Speaker 3: You're standing in the Borghese.

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Speaker 1: Well. Now, twenty eighteen, you wrote a book which you

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Speaker 1: allowed me to take an early look at, which I

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Speaker 1: found absolutely fascinating, entitled How Catholic Art Saved the Faith,

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Speaker 1: And I think this is a really useful kind of

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Speaker 1: entry point to get to talking about the Sistine Chapel,

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Speaker 1: but talk for a couple of minutes about how the

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Speaker 1: Church consciously built a strategy of appealing to people through art.

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Speaker 2: Thank you very much, by the way, for the nice

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Speaker 2: things you said about my book.

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Speaker 3: Very encouraging.

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Speaker 2: And the book itself is the fruit of two things.

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Speaker 2: What is my doctoral thesis. The thrust of it was

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Speaker 2: a discussion of to Reformation art. The other part is

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Speaker 2: the fruit of teaching a class of Baroque art at

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Speaker 2: Ducane University for twenty years and trying to explain to

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Speaker 2: these students what holds these works together.

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Speaker 3: And this body of work.

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Speaker 2: That is basically produced between fifteen seventy and let's say

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Speaker 2: sixteen fifty sixteen sixty, this body of work is a

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Speaker 2: very interesting collaboration between the Church in various forms, whether

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Speaker 2: it's confraternity, popes, cardinals, bishops, the church forming and patronizing

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Speaker 2: artists so that artists will produce works of art that

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Speaker 2: will help address issues that the Church is facing in

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Speaker 2: this particular period. So it's a very very rich period

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Speaker 2: in the sense that artists are being offered the possibility

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Speaker 2: to really proclaim great truths, great things.

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Speaker 3: Through their art.

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Speaker 2: And so we see people like Caravajo who are participating

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Speaker 2: in the idea of cooperating with Salvation when he produces

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Speaker 2: the amazing acts of mercy in Naples, or artists like

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Speaker 2: Bernini who shows us images of the art of dying well.

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Speaker 2: And so in these different categories and chunes that the

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Speaker 2: Catholic Church finds itself trying to defend and explain its faith.

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Speaker 2: It understands that art is one of the most potent

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Speaker 2: vehicles for helping people or to persuade people, and it

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Speaker 2: recruits these great artists, forms them, and then unleashes them

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Speaker 2: into the world to leave us this amazing body of art,

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Speaker 2: which is this counter reformation into the Baroque.

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Speaker 1: It's very striking the sheer genius of that period in

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Speaker 1: terms of art. I've always wondered how it came together

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Speaker 1: that you had that handful of people who still today

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Speaker 1: five hundred years later, tower above us and inspire us,

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Speaker 1: and achieved an ability to evoke the world. And what's

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Speaker 1: in many ways a romantic kind of way, that people

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Speaker 1: before them came close but didn't get there, and people

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Speaker 1: after them came close but didn't get there. Why do

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Speaker 1: you think you had this intersection with that many extraordinary artists.

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Speaker 2: I think the circumstances of creating a very desirable prize

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Speaker 2: in the world of art is what drew so many talents,

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Speaker 2: allowing patrons, allowing the public to really sift through and

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Speaker 2: allow the greats to rise to the top. If you

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Speaker 2: just have a couple of people dabbling in art because

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Speaker 2: it's something that they feel called to do, but there's

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Speaker 2: no real incentive to really give your all to art,

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Speaker 2: to live and die for art, it's a lot harder

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Speaker 2: that you're going to find these geniuses coming to the fore.

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Speaker 2: But given the fact that the place where you could

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Speaker 2: achieve fame, you could achieve status. You could become a

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Speaker 2: voice of authority, and you're not some dauber on a wall,

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Speaker 2: but you become a voice that stands alongside preachers as

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Speaker 2: mute theologians. As Cardinal Palliotti put it, the fact is

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Speaker 2: that that was an opportunity to shine that drew so

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Speaker 2: many talents, and then once those talents were all compressed

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Speaker 2: into the same couple of cities, they had to compete

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Speaker 2: with one another again, producing even greater and greater work.

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Speaker 2: They become more daring, they look for their individual styles.

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Speaker 2: Nobody has time to sit back on their artistic laurels

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Speaker 2: because the next guy's coming right up behind you. And

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Speaker 2: so I think this is kind of the formula for

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Speaker 2: excellence that the late sixteenth early seventeenth century was able

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Speaker 2: to produce, and not to mention the fact that it's

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Speaker 2: such a fabulous time for crossroads of science of discovery.

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Speaker 2: I mean, think of what's happening in this period. The

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Speaker 2: entire world is opening up, so they've circumnavigated the globe,

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Speaker 2: and you have information and peoples and embassies coming in

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Speaker 2: from all over the world for the very first time.

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Speaker 2: A sensitive person like an artist is feeding off this

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Speaker 2: universality that's happening. You have Galileo pointing at tele scope

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Speaker 2: towards the heavens and the human eye can see things

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Speaker 2: that the human eye was never able to see before.

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Speaker 3: How can that.

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Speaker 2: Not be exciting and inspiring to an artist, as the

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Speaker 2: artist has offered the possibility to be a kind of

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Speaker 2: telescope to the heavens, I'll show you something you've never

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Speaker 2: seen before. So I think it was a perfect storm

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Speaker 2: that happened in that period.

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Speaker 1: All of these guys, because it was their passion, they

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Speaker 1: do it their whole lives. I think Michael Angels was

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Speaker 1: in his early eighties when he's designing the dome for

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Speaker 1: Saint Peter's.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, he's working on the dome in his eighties, dies

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Speaker 2: three weeks shy of his ninetieth birthday working on the dome.

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Speaker 1: He is extraordinarily broad in his interest, although he's a

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Speaker 1: little bit more limited than da Vinci, who is sort

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Speaker 1: of this autodidact across everything. But seeing the two of them,

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Speaker 1: their level of invention and ingenuity is blowing things away,

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Speaker 1: is extraordinarily different than anything which had gone before. And

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Speaker 1: yet my sense is, at least in the case of

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Speaker 1: michael Angelo, the discoveries looking not only up to the

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Speaker 1: sky but looking back into the past. The discovery of

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Speaker 1: Greek and Roman statues and of various things coming out

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Speaker 1: of the ancient world, had suddenly widened the possibility of

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Speaker 1: thinking about how to perform in a way that would

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Speaker 1: not have been true, say, two hundred years earlier.

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Speaker 2: Absolutely, the rediscovery of these ancient works, particularly works like

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Speaker 2: the Apollo Belvedere contained in the Vatican Museums, and most

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Speaker 2: famously the ley Akowan, the first century sculpture of the

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Speaker 2: Trojan priests that was discovered or identified by Michelangelo and

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Speaker 2: his friend Juliana Sangallo in fifteen oh six, they are

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Speaker 2: as you might describe game changers. That takes us back

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Speaker 2: to the period of the Renaissance, where the Renaissance starts

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Speaker 2: to dig back in the past and they try to

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Speaker 2: find ways of using the beauty of the past in

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Speaker 2: order to enhance their presence. So in the case of

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Speaker 2: the age of Michelangelo, he's actually coming at the culmination

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Speaker 2: of this period that in many ways begins with people

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Speaker 2: like Thomas Aquinas who successfully capture Aristotle for Christendom, so

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Speaker 2: that people can use the ideas of Aristotle, even though

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Speaker 2: Aristotle is a pagan philosopher. Then the next thing you know,

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Speaker 2: you see the artists borrowing different motifs. Then you see

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Speaker 2: the popes collecting this kind of ancient art and putting

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Speaker 2: artists in front of it.

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Speaker 3: And then we see the artists.

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Speaker 2: Building on these ideas and creating whole new compositions using

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Speaker 2: the beauty, the order, the drama, the elegance of the

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Speaker 2: ancient world, so using that sort of formal affection of

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Speaker 2: the ancient world, but the substance becomes completely Christian. And

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Speaker 2: then Michelangelo lives long enough to see that hit its

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Speaker 2: apex and then start to move into this new age

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Speaker 2: where new things are happening, and this period of discovery,

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Speaker 2: in this period of new knowledge, so he actually lives

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Speaker 2: long enough he bridges both great phases of the Renaissance.

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Speaker 1: And in his case, my impression is he really starts

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Speaker 1: out as a sculptor.

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Speaker 2: Oh. Absolutely. He was first trained briefly as a painter,

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Speaker 2: his father probably hoping that Michelangelo would just take the

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Speaker 2: normal cursus honorum of artists, meaning that he would be

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Speaker 2: apprenticed to a successful studio, he would become good at

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Speaker 2: his job, the studio head in this case, Domenico Garlando,

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Speaker 2: would lean on him and eventually Michelangelo would take over

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Speaker 2: the studio and he would be a successful businessman. And

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Speaker 2: that was the father's limited aspirations. Michelangelo, who's the only

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Speaker 2: source of Michelangelo's life is Michelangelo, So we always have

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Speaker 2: to take it with a head of a grain of salt.

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Speaker 2: Clearly clearly had very other ideas about what he was

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Speaker 2: destined to be, and so as soon as he saw

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Speaker 2: an opportunity, he left the painting school, probably around age fifteen,

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Speaker 2: and he began training as a sculptor, and within a

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Speaker 2: few years, by the time he was twenty three, he

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Speaker 2: had landed a commission to make the Pieta, which is

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Speaker 2: in Saint Peter's Basilica, and then hard on the heels

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Speaker 2: of the Pieta, he gets the commission for the David.

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Speaker 2: And it's right after David completed in fifteen oh four

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Speaker 2: that he gets called to Rome by Julius the second

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Speaker 2: again to produce a sculptural tomb. Because Michelangelo had focused

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Speaker 2: his attention he was famous as a sculptor, he had

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Speaker 2: produced famous sculptors. So obviously, if Julius the second had

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Speaker 2: invited him to Rome to come and paint a ceiling,

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Speaker 2: Michaelangelo would have said something along the lines of do

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Speaker 2: you not know what I do? Are you talking about?

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Speaker 2: So the invitation was actually to produce what was planned

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Speaker 2: to be an extraordinary tomb, a monument that would have

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Speaker 2: been free standing and would have rivaled the Seven Wonders

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Speaker 2: of the ancient world.

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Speaker 1: I remember you took chlisten me, and we had this

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Speaker 1: marvelous opportunity to see the Paeta, and the idea that

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Speaker 1: he could have carved that at that age and had

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Speaker 1: it so exquisite. I mean, that could almost be the

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Speaker 1: peak of a normal person's life, and for him it's

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Speaker 1: the beginning. It's just astonishing.

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Speaker 2: I was just standing in front of the copy of

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Speaker 2: it today in the Vatican Museums, and it came to

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Speaker 2: my mind for the millionth time. It's amazing how perfectly

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Speaker 2: thought out that work is for a twenty three year old,

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Speaker 2: and perfectly thought out in the way the body is

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Speaker 2: going to be rendered. So he's so confident of himself

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Speaker 2: that he takes what is fundamentally a Greco Roman style body.

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Speaker 3: The body of Jesus.

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Speaker 2: This work is clearly styled after a statue of a

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Speaker 2: Greco Roman god. But then he adds these touches that

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Speaker 2: come from the observation of a lifeless person, so he

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Speaker 2: takes the paradigm of the Greek immortal God, and then

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Speaker 2: he makes the god lifeless with these very poignant images

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Speaker 2: of a slumped shoulder or these muscles that are slumped

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Speaker 2: in the thigh. In certain sense, the arrogance of being

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Speaker 2: able to say, those ancient people, I have nothing to

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Speaker 2: say to them. I just I am going to take this idea.

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Speaker 2: I'm going to apply my own idea. And then the

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Speaker 2: theological acumen that is implied in that work by the

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Speaker 2: way that Jesus's body is polished so that he becomes

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Speaker 2: Christ the light, the way the body looks like it's

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Speaker 2: going to fall on the altar. It reminds me of

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Speaker 2: that story or the mythological idea that Minerva sprang complete

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Speaker 2: out of the head of Jupiter, so that it's almost like,

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Speaker 2: where did this Michelangelo's art just spring complete out of nowhere?

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Speaker 2: And it isn't really an indication of a man who

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Speaker 2: was clearly destined to do great things. I often say

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Speaker 2: that when you look at the Pieta, you understand why

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Speaker 2: Rome put Michelangelo on a retractable leash at this point,

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Speaker 2: because how far away would you let a guy get

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Speaker 2: who can do that kind of stuff at age twenty three?

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Speaker 1: And he goes from that, which is a very delicate,

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Speaker 1: very kind of human moment of Mary holding her dead son,

387
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Speaker 1: and he turns around. He goes back to Florence and

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Speaker 1: builds this gigantic statue of the David, which in many

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Speaker 1: ways is almost the antithesism. It's huge, he's muscled, he's powerful.

390
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Speaker 1: You can imagine that he of course would have killed Goliath,

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Speaker 1: because why would he be afraid of Goliath? And every

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Speaker 1: time I've gone to the Academia and seen it I've

393
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Speaker 1: just been startled by how powerful a figure it is

394
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Speaker 1: and what a stunning comparison it is to the Pata.

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Speaker 2: Data is an interesting one because, yes, David is a

396
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Speaker 2: colossal statue. It's seventeen feet tall, it's six tons, It's

397
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Speaker 2: a statue meant for an exterior position. It's a statue

398
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Speaker 2: that was made not for a chapel, but it's made

399
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Speaker 2: for the Republic of Florence. So they're very, very different.

400
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Speaker 2: And yet there is a very interesting way that the

401
00:23:30,080 --> 00:23:36,600
Speaker 2: two are united, and they are united through this strange dichotomy.

402
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Speaker 2: In the work in the Body of Jesus and the Pieta,

403
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Speaker 2: we see the body that is evidently meant to be

404
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Speaker 2: that of a Greek god, and yet we see these

405
00:23:44,920 --> 00:23:48,720
Speaker 2: signs of a lifeless man. In the case of David,

406
00:23:49,119 --> 00:23:54,120
Speaker 2: we see this colossal, muscle bound, powerful figure. At our

407
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Speaker 2: first glance is, of course, you look at a seventeen

408
00:23:57,520 --> 00:24:00,440
Speaker 2: foot tall David and you think Publig was Goliath, Right,

409
00:24:00,560 --> 00:24:03,040
Speaker 2: what's the problem here? You start to feel sorry for

410
00:24:03,119 --> 00:24:06,600
Speaker 2: Goliath in this story. So having done that, since the

411
00:24:06,640 --> 00:24:09,399
Speaker 2: whole point of the David story is that there is

412
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Speaker 2: no way David could have defeated Goliath. Michelangelo's new problem

413
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Speaker 2: is how do we show the vulnerability the weakness of David.

414
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Speaker 2: And he does it in two very interesting ways. One

415
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Speaker 2: is the strange proportions of the body. So if you

416
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Speaker 2: put David next to a classical Greek sculpture, let's say

417
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Speaker 2: the Apollo we were just talking about, David will come

418
00:24:34,000 --> 00:24:39,560
Speaker 2: across as stranger and stranger, with his excessively long legs,

419
00:24:39,880 --> 00:24:43,639
Speaker 2: his very big hands, his gigantic head on top of

420
00:24:43,680 --> 00:24:48,360
Speaker 2: a small neck. All of those proportions are distorted as

421
00:24:48,359 --> 00:24:51,959
Speaker 2: opposed to the perfect and elegant proportions that you see

422
00:24:52,000 --> 00:24:56,040
Speaker 2: in a classical sculpture. And by elongating and giving us

423
00:24:56,160 --> 00:25:01,720
Speaker 2: this strange, awkward series of body parts that David, at

424
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Speaker 2: the end of the day he was an adolescent boy,

425
00:25:05,359 --> 00:25:09,600
Speaker 2: he's giving us the potential of David, that seventeen foot

426
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Speaker 2: man he's going to grow into, but then he hasn't

427
00:25:13,160 --> 00:25:16,680
Speaker 2: quite grown into it yet, and you have that awkwardness

428
00:25:16,680 --> 00:25:21,520
Speaker 2: of transformation. The second way Michaelangelo makes David more human

429
00:25:22,440 --> 00:25:26,480
Speaker 2: is to give us that furrowed brow as he stares

430
00:25:26,640 --> 00:25:30,480
Speaker 2: off into the distance. David is worried. He looks into

431
00:25:30,520 --> 00:25:34,199
Speaker 2: the distance with a furrow in his brow, a concern

432
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Speaker 2: about what's coming. So it's a very very interesting system

433
00:25:37,760 --> 00:25:42,480
Speaker 2: he used where he gives us monumentality and vulnerability in

434
00:25:42,560 --> 00:25:44,560
Speaker 2: the same work. And I think that's why David, of

435
00:25:44,600 --> 00:25:46,840
Speaker 2: all the naked statues that we have all over the

436
00:25:46,840 --> 00:25:57,840
Speaker 2: place in Italy, that's why David stands out.

437
00:26:06,240 --> 00:26:09,920
Speaker 1: So I have this guy now who has had two

438
00:26:09,960 --> 00:26:13,720
Speaker 1: extraordinary successes as a sculptor. He ends up in Rome,

439
00:26:14,240 --> 00:26:17,920
Speaker 1: and Julius the second says, Oh, by the way, now

440
00:26:17,920 --> 00:26:20,120
Speaker 1: it's your turn, because this is what you're teaching. How

441
00:26:20,119 --> 00:26:20,879
Speaker 1: does it happen?

442
00:26:21,400 --> 00:26:24,919
Speaker 2: He says to Michaelangelo, build me this tomb. And Michael

443
00:26:24,920 --> 00:26:27,199
Speaker 2: Angel starts to work on the tomb, he finds the

444
00:26:27,280 --> 00:26:34,040
Speaker 2: leaka on. Everything is going amazingly well, and then suddenly

445
00:26:34,280 --> 00:26:38,600
Speaker 2: the money dries up. And there's Michelangelo who's so convinced

446
00:26:38,640 --> 00:26:41,440
Speaker 2: he's supposed to be making this tomb that he's literally

447
00:26:41,560 --> 00:26:44,840
Speaker 2: fronting his own money to keep the job going. And

448
00:26:44,880 --> 00:26:46,840
Speaker 2: then finally they tell him, listen, we're not.

449
00:26:46,840 --> 00:26:48,920
Speaker 3: Going to be making the tomb. Could you paint the.

450
00:26:48,920 --> 00:26:52,600
Speaker 2: Twelve apostles in the Sistine Chapel ceiling? And here is

451
00:26:52,640 --> 00:26:56,240
Speaker 2: the problem. The twelve apostles in the Sistine Chapel ceiling

452
00:26:56,359 --> 00:27:00,640
Speaker 2: is going to look like every ceiling in Italy traveled

453
00:27:00,640 --> 00:27:03,200
Speaker 2: from north to south in this country. You walk into

454
00:27:03,240 --> 00:27:05,560
Speaker 2: a chapel, you look up at the ceiling, and the

455
00:27:05,600 --> 00:27:08,400
Speaker 2: ceiling is a blue sky with stars, with some evangelists

456
00:27:08,480 --> 00:27:11,960
Speaker 2: or with some apostles, few figures against a blue sky.

457
00:27:12,520 --> 00:27:17,080
Speaker 2: Michelangelo cannot afford to do something like that because it

458
00:27:17,119 --> 00:27:20,520
Speaker 2: will be mistaken for every other ceiling in Italy. It's

459
00:27:20,560 --> 00:27:24,520
Speaker 2: like you've had two Academy Award winning movies and then

460
00:27:24,560 --> 00:27:28,000
Speaker 2: they ask you to do a commercial, and so Michelangelo

461
00:27:28,200 --> 00:27:32,200
Speaker 2: instead comes back to the Pope and that same arrogance,

462
00:27:32,280 --> 00:27:38,320
Speaker 2: to a certain extent, that same self confidence, which is extraordinary.

463
00:27:38,400 --> 00:27:41,399
Speaker 2: He goes back to the Pope and he says, yeah, okay,

464
00:27:41,800 --> 00:27:47,160
Speaker 2: so I'm thinking we could do stories of Genesis and Julius. Rightfully,

465
00:27:47,359 --> 00:27:50,439
Speaker 2: objects like, no, we can't do stories on the ceiling.

466
00:27:50,760 --> 00:27:53,320
Speaker 2: If you look at all those famous paintings of the

467
00:27:53,400 --> 00:27:58,480
Speaker 2: predecessors of the people who taught Michelangelo, like Girlando Balticelli,

468
00:27:58,640 --> 00:28:03,080
Speaker 2: friend of Michelangelo's, even Leonardo da Vinci, all of them

469
00:28:03,200 --> 00:28:06,960
Speaker 2: conceive painting in the same way. You make a space,

470
00:28:07,359 --> 00:28:11,280
Speaker 2: you fill up the space, and that is how painting works.

471
00:28:11,320 --> 00:28:14,840
Speaker 2: You use perspective, you use depth, you use composition, but

472
00:28:15,000 --> 00:28:17,720
Speaker 2: you create a space and then you fill it up.

473
00:28:18,160 --> 00:28:21,800
Speaker 2: If you take a painting with a filled up space

474
00:28:21,960 --> 00:28:24,760
Speaker 2: and you put it on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel,

475
00:28:24,760 --> 00:28:27,440
Speaker 2: which is twenty seven feet off the ground, it will

476
00:28:27,480 --> 00:28:31,000
Speaker 2: look like a Jackson Pollock painting. And Julius doesn't think

477
00:28:31,080 --> 00:28:33,359
Speaker 2: it can be tice. I don't want a bunch of

478
00:28:33,359 --> 00:28:36,080
Speaker 2: figures on the ceiling and no one understands what's happening.

479
00:28:36,480 --> 00:28:40,160
Speaker 2: And when Michaelangelo shows him the drawings he has planned,

480
00:28:40,680 --> 00:28:44,320
Speaker 2: when he shows him the idea for the ceiling, Julius

481
00:28:44,400 --> 00:28:49,200
Speaker 2: realizes he has the one man in the entire world

482
00:28:49,600 --> 00:28:52,800
Speaker 2: who can paint a scene on a ceiling and make

483
00:28:52,880 --> 00:28:57,040
Speaker 2: it understandable because he's got a sculptor in front of

484
00:28:57,120 --> 00:29:01,080
Speaker 2: him and not a painter. And as a skull, Michelangelo

485
00:29:01,160 --> 00:29:04,239
Speaker 2: has trained to look at a piece of stone and

486
00:29:04,320 --> 00:29:09,680
Speaker 2: to think reductively. A sculptor takes away, reducing piece after

487
00:29:09,760 --> 00:29:13,640
Speaker 2: piece after piece, until this single figure tells the story in.

488
00:29:13,560 --> 00:29:14,400
Speaker 3: And of itself.

489
00:29:14,760 --> 00:29:18,040
Speaker 2: It is the opposite from how a painter thinks where

490
00:29:18,080 --> 00:29:20,920
Speaker 2: the painter takes the space and fills it. And from

491
00:29:21,000 --> 00:29:24,680
Speaker 2: that moment Julius says to Michelangelo, what do you want?

492
00:29:24,880 --> 00:29:28,120
Speaker 2: What can I give you? Please get started. I can't wait.

493
00:29:28,560 --> 00:29:31,640
Speaker 2: And the rest truly is history. Where we have a

494
00:29:31,880 --> 00:29:35,280
Speaker 2: watershed in the history of art, a painting on a

495
00:29:35,320 --> 00:29:39,800
Speaker 2: ceiling that is evidently and obviously created by a man

496
00:29:39,840 --> 00:29:43,320
Speaker 2: who was thinking in terms of a sculptor architect. So

497
00:29:43,520 --> 00:29:47,560
Speaker 2: basically Michelangelo, that tomb he had wanted to build so badly.

498
00:29:48,040 --> 00:29:51,080
Speaker 2: He built it anyway. He built it in paint, and

499
00:29:51,120 --> 00:29:53,280
Speaker 2: he built it on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

500
00:29:53,920 --> 00:29:55,440
Speaker 1: First of all, when you're in the chapel, he look

501
00:29:55,520 --> 00:29:59,000
Speaker 1: up your eyes bad to have scaffolding to climb up

502
00:29:59,040 --> 00:30:02,600
Speaker 1: every single day, and then he lays on his back.

503
00:30:03,240 --> 00:30:08,160
Speaker 1: The technique they're using is very laborious and very time sensored.

504
00:30:08,280 --> 00:30:11,360
Speaker 1: Can you walk through how they were actually because it's

505
00:30:11,400 --> 00:30:13,880
Speaker 1: not painting in the sense of oil and putting it

506
00:30:13,920 --> 00:30:16,240
Speaker 1: on canvas. It's a very very different and I think

507
00:30:16,320 --> 00:30:18,000
Speaker 1: harder process.

508
00:30:18,960 --> 00:30:22,920
Speaker 2: It is a very exacting technique. The fresco painting technique

509
00:30:22,960 --> 00:30:25,560
Speaker 2: that he used on the ceiling. He had been taught

510
00:30:26,120 --> 00:30:28,760
Speaker 2: in the studio of Girlindiyo when he was a boy

511
00:30:28,960 --> 00:30:33,120
Speaker 2: how to do this technique, and perhaps more importantly than

512
00:30:33,200 --> 00:30:37,800
Speaker 2: the actual physical mixing and application of color, he learned

513
00:30:37,880 --> 00:30:41,880
Speaker 2: about running the studio that has to produce the fresco.

514
00:30:42,120 --> 00:30:47,000
Speaker 2: Because fresco is a lime plaster and lime plaster that

515
00:30:47,120 --> 00:30:49,680
Speaker 2: is applied on the wall, and to be perfectly honest,

516
00:30:49,720 --> 00:30:52,200
Speaker 2: it's not just one layer. There's three layers that have

517
00:30:52,240 --> 00:30:54,480
Speaker 2: to be put up on the wall. The final layer

518
00:30:54,560 --> 00:30:58,360
Speaker 2: will receive the paint while the final layer, a very

519
00:30:58,400 --> 00:31:02,240
Speaker 2: fine plaster, is on the wall. The painter approaches with

520
00:31:02,320 --> 00:31:06,680
Speaker 2: a pigment dissolved in water, essentially water color, and paints

521
00:31:06,800 --> 00:31:10,120
Speaker 2: onto the wet plaster. Hence the term fresco is like

522
00:31:10,240 --> 00:31:14,120
Speaker 2: fresh paint, and there's a chemical reaction that happens between

523
00:31:14,160 --> 00:31:16,640
Speaker 2: the lime in the plaster and the water in the

524
00:31:16,680 --> 00:31:21,000
Speaker 2: water color. It essentially sweats calcium carbonate and it becomes

525
00:31:21,080 --> 00:31:24,680
Speaker 2: colored stone. There is a six hour window from the

526
00:31:24,720 --> 00:31:28,120
Speaker 2: application of the plaster to when it will dry, which

527
00:31:28,200 --> 00:31:32,520
Speaker 2: means for a fresco painter. For Michelangelo in particular, when

528
00:31:32,520 --> 00:31:35,239
Speaker 2: he got up on that scaffolding, he had to have

529
00:31:35,360 --> 00:31:37,920
Speaker 2: a very small team, So the idea that he was

530
00:31:37,960 --> 00:31:42,520
Speaker 2: working alone is flat out. Someone has to be grinding pigment,

531
00:31:42,960 --> 00:31:45,520
Speaker 2: someone has to be mixing plaster, someone has to be

532
00:31:45,560 --> 00:31:48,520
Speaker 2: applying the sketches to the ceiling. Someone's got to go

533
00:31:48,520 --> 00:31:50,120
Speaker 2: get peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.

534
00:31:50,400 --> 00:31:51,000
Speaker 3: There's got to.

535
00:31:51,000 --> 00:31:55,120
Speaker 2: Be a team working, so that six hours is very efficient.

536
00:31:55,920 --> 00:31:59,080
Speaker 2: He has to know exactly what he's doing. It is

537
00:31:59,080 --> 00:32:01,960
Speaker 2: not a technique that allows winging it. If you make

538
00:32:02,000 --> 00:32:05,160
Speaker 2: a mistake and the paint dries, you are going to

539
00:32:05,200 --> 00:32:08,680
Speaker 2: have to chisel it out. So it was a very

540
00:32:08,880 --> 00:32:12,800
Speaker 2: very demanding technique, but it does require that he work

541
00:32:12,880 --> 00:32:15,920
Speaker 2: with a certain amount of speed. So what the painter

542
00:32:16,080 --> 00:32:20,920
Speaker 2: does to modulate his work is he decides how much

543
00:32:21,280 --> 00:32:24,840
Speaker 2: space he thinks he can cover in six weeks. And

544
00:32:24,880 --> 00:32:29,560
Speaker 2: when he first started towards the entrance of the chapel

545
00:32:30,000 --> 00:32:32,320
Speaker 2: on the scaffolding of his own design, he ended up

546
00:32:32,320 --> 00:32:35,240
Speaker 2: having to design his own scaffolding because all the other

547
00:32:35,320 --> 00:32:38,840
Speaker 2: ideas seemed very silly or even dangerous to him. So

548
00:32:38,920 --> 00:32:42,240
Speaker 2: after he had designed his scaffolding, he gets up on

549
00:32:42,320 --> 00:32:46,480
Speaker 2: the scaffolding and he starts painting in the side closest

550
00:32:46,680 --> 00:32:49,840
Speaker 2: to the entrance and exit door above the area where

551
00:32:49,880 --> 00:32:53,880
Speaker 2: the lay people were gathered. Those images took a very

552
00:32:53,920 --> 00:32:57,280
Speaker 2: long time to paint, so one of them, which would

553
00:32:57,320 --> 00:33:01,240
Speaker 2: be the story of Noah's arc the Great Flood, took

554
00:33:01,400 --> 00:33:04,760
Speaker 2: about six weeks for him to paint. At the end

555
00:33:04,760 --> 00:33:06,920
Speaker 2: of the three and a half years, he made it

556
00:33:07,040 --> 00:33:10,240
Speaker 2: over to the area by the altar. He was working

557
00:33:10,360 --> 00:33:14,400
Speaker 2: so quickly and so efficiently that the opening scene of

558
00:33:14,440 --> 00:33:17,360
Speaker 2: the Sistine Chapel, the Separation of Light and Dark, he

559
00:33:17,400 --> 00:33:22,000
Speaker 2: succeeded in painting in one day. He painted actually in

560
00:33:22,160 --> 00:33:26,160
Speaker 2: different positions. The most famous position we know he painted

561
00:33:26,200 --> 00:33:30,040
Speaker 2: in was actually standing with his head thrown backwards. And

562
00:33:30,080 --> 00:33:33,880
Speaker 2: the reason why we know this is because Michaelangelo's dislike

563
00:33:34,000 --> 00:33:37,760
Speaker 2: of this commission was so great that he vented by

564
00:33:37,800 --> 00:33:40,120
Speaker 2: writing a poem to a friend of his. And the

565
00:33:40,160 --> 00:33:43,520
Speaker 2: poem complains about what it's like having his head thrown

566
00:33:43,680 --> 00:33:47,000
Speaker 2: back and his chest pulled upwards, and he feels like

567
00:33:47,080 --> 00:33:50,920
Speaker 2: a Lombard cat with the cats grow fat. And he

568
00:33:51,080 --> 00:33:53,840
Speaker 2: talks about this, and then he did a little caricature

569
00:33:53,880 --> 00:33:57,240
Speaker 2: on the side, an image of himself painting the ceiling.

570
00:33:57,560 --> 00:34:01,239
Speaker 2: So sometimes he stood, sometime he sat. There was a

571
00:34:01,280 --> 00:34:04,320
Speaker 2: little section on the sidewalls where he could sit along

572
00:34:04,400 --> 00:34:07,440
Speaker 2: the side of the fresco. But no matter what, it

573
00:34:07,520 --> 00:34:11,359
Speaker 2: was a very physically grueling process which involved a lot

574
00:34:11,400 --> 00:34:15,239
Speaker 2: of paint dropping onto his face, which he also complained

575
00:34:15,239 --> 00:34:16,200
Speaker 2: about at length.

576
00:34:16,920 --> 00:34:20,160
Speaker 1: How did he envision how big it has to be

577
00:34:20,320 --> 00:34:23,960
Speaker 1: up there to seem normal when you're twenty seven feet

578
00:34:24,480 --> 00:34:27,560
Speaker 1: lower to me. That's one of the most amazing things

579
00:34:27,560 --> 00:34:30,400
Speaker 1: about the Sisteine Chapels, that it all works. And yet

580
00:34:30,440 --> 00:34:33,640
Speaker 1: you realize he's putting the stuff up here twenty seven

581
00:34:33,680 --> 00:34:37,160
Speaker 1: feet for me to look at, and when he's doing it,

582
00:34:37,160 --> 00:34:39,800
Speaker 1: he's right next to us. He must have some ability

583
00:34:40,440 --> 00:34:44,919
Speaker 1: to imagine all this with a perspective that normal people

584
00:34:44,960 --> 00:34:45,680
Speaker 1: would not have had.

585
00:34:46,560 --> 00:34:50,919
Speaker 2: So what he has is a very interesting group of

586
00:34:51,360 --> 00:34:54,640
Speaker 2: people who are highly specialized in this kind of work.

587
00:34:54,920 --> 00:34:57,719
Speaker 2: So michael Angelo worked out a drawing of what he

588
00:34:57,760 --> 00:34:59,239
Speaker 2: was going to do on the ceiling, and yes, he

589
00:34:59,320 --> 00:35:01,960
Speaker 2: has to know a exactly the right size. It has

590
00:35:02,040 --> 00:35:05,160
Speaker 2: to be perfectly measured out, and he brought down a

591
00:35:05,200 --> 00:35:10,080
Speaker 2: team of Florentine artists, and Florentines were very very good

592
00:35:10,560 --> 00:35:13,440
Speaker 2: at doing what today we would put into a photocopy machine.

593
00:35:13,440 --> 00:35:15,719
Speaker 2: And program the photocopy machine have it blow out up

594
00:35:15,760 --> 00:35:20,520
Speaker 2: to whichever proportion or ratio we wanted. But these Florentines

595
00:35:20,520 --> 00:35:24,600
Speaker 2: were very good at taking Michelangelo's drawing and breaking them

596
00:35:24,640 --> 00:35:28,120
Speaker 2: out into actual sized drawings, so that at the end

597
00:35:28,200 --> 00:35:32,200
Speaker 2: of the day, when he approached each section of the ceiling,

598
00:35:32,600 --> 00:35:36,000
Speaker 2: he went up with a working cartoon, which means that

599
00:35:36,120 --> 00:35:38,880
Speaker 2: he would put it up against the wall. He would

600
00:35:38,920 --> 00:35:42,880
Speaker 2: either take a sharp instrument and punch out the outlines

601
00:35:42,960 --> 00:35:45,200
Speaker 2: of the drawing and then put up charcoal ust so

602
00:35:45,239 --> 00:35:47,799
Speaker 2: when he pulled the drawing away there would be a

603
00:35:47,840 --> 00:35:52,160
Speaker 2: dotted line. Another technique he might use was an incision technique,

604
00:35:52,400 --> 00:35:55,319
Speaker 2: where he would just cut through the lines and make

605
00:35:55,600 --> 00:35:59,279
Speaker 2: grooves into the painting itself. There are different ways of

606
00:35:59,320 --> 00:36:02,920
Speaker 2: doing this. He had these blueprints, if you will, of

607
00:36:03,120 --> 00:36:06,080
Speaker 2: how each part of the ceiling was supposed to be

608
00:36:06,200 --> 00:36:08,640
Speaker 2: arranged and where it was supposed to be placed.

609
00:36:08,840 --> 00:36:11,560
Speaker 1: So he completes it, it's done, he goes back to

610
00:36:11,600 --> 00:36:16,600
Speaker 1: being a sculptor, and then in fifteen thirty five he

611
00:36:16,680 --> 00:36:18,680
Speaker 1: comes back to paint the last Judgment, which is in

612
00:36:18,719 --> 00:36:22,120
Speaker 1: some ways the most striking single thing in the Sistine Chapel.

613
00:36:23,360 --> 00:36:24,360
Speaker 1: How did that happen.

614
00:36:24,680 --> 00:36:26,880
Speaker 2: It's an amazing thing that both paintings are in the

615
00:36:26,960 --> 00:36:32,000
Speaker 2: same space because they transmit very very different moods. And

616
00:36:32,200 --> 00:36:36,600
Speaker 2: the difference between the world that thirty three year old

617
00:36:36,680 --> 00:36:41,120
Speaker 2: Michelangelo knew when he started painting the Sistine Chapel ceiling

618
00:36:41,920 --> 00:36:45,359
Speaker 2: and the world of fifty nine year old Michelangelo coming

619
00:36:45,400 --> 00:36:48,879
Speaker 2: in to paint the Last Judgment was completely different, and

620
00:36:48,920 --> 00:36:51,200
Speaker 2: in the space of a generation, the world in many

621
00:36:51,239 --> 00:36:55,240
Speaker 2: ways was unrecognizable to him. The Protestant Reformation had happened

622
00:36:55,280 --> 00:36:59,040
Speaker 2: in fifteen seventeen, so between these two moments, and in

623
00:36:59,080 --> 00:37:03,279
Speaker 2: the Protestant reference, the unthinkable event of a church that

624
00:37:03,320 --> 00:37:07,319
Speaker 2: had been united throughout Europe suddenly breaks in two, three,

625
00:37:07,680 --> 00:37:12,160
Speaker 2: four five pieces. So first of all, we have the fragmentation.

626
00:37:11,520 --> 00:37:13,400
Speaker 3: Of something that he thought was rock solid.

627
00:37:13,800 --> 00:37:17,439
Speaker 2: Number two, the recognition that for him personally, that tomb

628
00:37:17,520 --> 00:37:20,680
Speaker 2: will never be built, that tomb that motivated him to

629
00:37:20,760 --> 00:37:23,799
Speaker 2: design the Cistine Chapel to work incredibly quickly so he

630
00:37:23,840 --> 00:37:26,080
Speaker 2: could go back to building the tomb that he thought

631
00:37:26,120 --> 00:37:29,080
Speaker 2: we would associate his name with it has become a

632
00:37:29,120 --> 00:37:32,760
Speaker 2: colossal failure. And then the other things that are happening

633
00:37:32,880 --> 00:37:35,200
Speaker 2: are the rise of the printing press and a new

634
00:37:35,239 --> 00:37:39,640
Speaker 2: way of transmitting images and transmitting information that is becoming

635
00:37:39,719 --> 00:37:42,960
Speaker 2: much faster and much more popular. And so he is

636
00:37:43,080 --> 00:37:46,560
Speaker 2: commissioned in the midst of this period of the Reformation

637
00:37:47,120 --> 00:37:49,760
Speaker 2: by Pope Paul the Third, the man who will approve

638
00:37:49,840 --> 00:37:52,480
Speaker 2: the Jesuits, the man who will open the Council of Trent.

639
00:37:53,040 --> 00:37:57,160
Speaker 2: He asks Michelangelo to come and paint on the altar

640
00:37:57,440 --> 00:38:00,920
Speaker 2: wall of the Cistine Chapel, and image that is not

641
00:38:01,160 --> 00:38:04,400
Speaker 2: destined for your everyday, run of the mill lay people.

642
00:38:04,760 --> 00:38:07,719
Speaker 2: It is an image which is destined to speak to

643
00:38:07,960 --> 00:38:10,839
Speaker 2: the elite group of the papal corps, who have had

644
00:38:10,880 --> 00:38:13,840
Speaker 2: the best of the church and are now being reminded

645
00:38:13,880 --> 00:38:15,319
Speaker 2: of their responsibilities.

646
00:38:15,600 --> 00:38:16,320
Speaker 3: I think it's.

647
00:38:16,440 --> 00:38:20,000
Speaker 2: Very interesting that the commission for Michaelangelo starts putting up

648
00:38:20,000 --> 00:38:24,800
Speaker 2: his scaffolding immediately after Henry the eighth sends that letter

649
00:38:24,880 --> 00:38:27,400
Speaker 2: to Pope Clement the seventh which goes something along the

650
00:38:27,440 --> 00:38:30,520
Speaker 2: lines of high starting my own church. Love Henry, signed

651
00:38:30,520 --> 00:38:32,880
Speaker 2: by all the cardinals and bishops of England except for

652
00:38:32,920 --> 00:38:36,680
Speaker 2: John Fisher. But the fact is the Pope is seeing

653
00:38:36,719 --> 00:38:38,920
Speaker 2: an exodus on the part of the people who are

654
00:38:38,920 --> 00:38:41,719
Speaker 2: supposed to be loyal to him, and that painting of

655
00:38:41,760 --> 00:38:45,400
Speaker 2: the Last Judgment, which Michaelangelo is expected to produce, is

656
00:38:45,480 --> 00:38:47,960
Speaker 2: meant to be a reminder that it's not the Pope

657
00:38:47,960 --> 00:38:50,160
Speaker 2: that they're going to have to fool, it's Jesus.

658
00:38:50,560 --> 00:38:52,080
Speaker 3: And so the visual.

659
00:38:51,760 --> 00:38:55,880
Speaker 2: Language of that work is unlike anything anyone has ever

660
00:38:55,920 --> 00:38:57,840
Speaker 2: seen before in less judgment images.

661
00:38:58,239 --> 00:39:01,600
Speaker 1: Well, and of course nowadays that is the room in

662
00:39:01,640 --> 00:39:03,560
Speaker 1: which the Church gathers to pick popes.

663
00:39:03,960 --> 00:39:07,960
Speaker 2: Absolutely when that makes it the ultimate painting of accountability.

664
00:39:08,560 --> 00:39:10,759
Speaker 1: I'm just thinking about that. You're a cardinal, You're sitting there,

665
00:39:10,760 --> 00:39:13,839
Speaker 1: you're about to vote, and you're looking at judgment and

666
00:39:13,880 --> 00:39:16,040
Speaker 1: you realize that actually the person that will judge you

667
00:39:16,120 --> 00:39:16,480
Speaker 1: is God.

668
00:39:17,360 --> 00:39:21,120
Speaker 2: Cardinal Powell of Beloved Memory once mentioned what it was

669
00:39:21,320 --> 00:39:24,279
Speaker 2: like to be in there with that painting looking down

670
00:39:24,360 --> 00:39:27,120
Speaker 2: on you as you cast the vote of the pope

671
00:39:27,239 --> 00:39:30,319
Speaker 2: in the urn that goes directly underneath it. And as

672
00:39:30,360 --> 00:39:32,040
Speaker 2: a matter of fact, if you look at the way

673
00:39:32,239 --> 00:39:36,759
Speaker 2: the painting is arranged, the painting looks like the tablets

674
00:39:36,760 --> 00:39:40,280
Speaker 2: of the Ten Commandments, right, so it has this feeling

675
00:39:40,480 --> 00:39:46,200
Speaker 2: of that ultimate, essential, fundamental tenet of the faith that's

676
00:39:46,480 --> 00:39:52,120
Speaker 2: looming behind you. It's tilted slightly forward, so it seems

677
00:39:52,160 --> 00:39:56,080
Speaker 2: like you're about to be completely engulfed in this moment

678
00:39:56,160 --> 00:40:01,080
Speaker 2: of retribution, moment of accountability, moment of judgment.

679
00:40:01,680 --> 00:40:04,319
Speaker 1: My sense has always been, and I say this for

680
00:40:04,400 --> 00:40:07,560
Speaker 1: all of our listeners who might someday go there, even

681
00:40:07,560 --> 00:40:09,799
Speaker 1: when it's crowded, if you can go in there and

682
00:40:09,880 --> 00:40:14,680
Speaker 1: be quiet and let the room talk to you, that

683
00:40:14,760 --> 00:40:18,440
Speaker 1: it's one of the most extraordinary places on the entire planet.

684
00:40:18,840 --> 00:40:20,799
Speaker 1: And that is just virtually overwhelming.

685
00:40:21,600 --> 00:40:24,200
Speaker 2: I have seen the Cystine Chapel with no one in it,

686
00:40:24,320 --> 00:40:27,000
Speaker 2: with tons of people in it, with dangerous numbers of

687
00:40:27,040 --> 00:40:30,200
Speaker 2: people in it. I completely agree with you, Nude. I

688
00:40:30,360 --> 00:40:33,600
Speaker 2: find the first of all, the artwork of the Sistine

689
00:40:33,680 --> 00:40:37,920
Speaker 2: Chapel is above my head, or sort of looking upwards

690
00:40:37,960 --> 00:40:40,720
Speaker 2: at the space of the altar, and so I found

691
00:40:40,800 --> 00:40:44,480
Speaker 2: that I can just make everything else and disappear and

692
00:40:44,600 --> 00:40:46,959
Speaker 2: just get involved with the ceiling. I find it much

693
00:40:47,040 --> 00:40:50,040
Speaker 2: harder to be in the Raphael rooms when it's crowded.

694
00:40:50,040 --> 00:40:52,399
Speaker 2: I can't look, I can't understand, I can't think I'm

695
00:40:52,440 --> 00:40:55,240
Speaker 2: aware of the crowd. But the Sistine Chapel has always

696
00:40:55,280 --> 00:40:57,479
Speaker 2: been a place where I felt that there's a way

697
00:40:57,520 --> 00:41:01,480
Speaker 2: to literally kind of rise above in my mind, and

698
00:41:01,600 --> 00:41:04,920
Speaker 2: it is of course also connected to the placement of

699
00:41:05,000 --> 00:41:07,640
Speaker 2: the works of art, and so it's true, Yes, I

700
00:41:07,719 --> 00:41:08,399
Speaker 2: agree with you.

701
00:41:08,680 --> 00:41:11,600
Speaker 1: Well in a sense if you're a question the Last

702
00:41:11,680 --> 00:41:15,440
Speaker 1: Judgment may be the most powerful painting over painted, and

703
00:41:15,600 --> 00:41:20,120
Speaker 1: it's there, and it's overwhelming, and it is God.

704
00:41:19,560 --> 00:41:22,680
Speaker 2: I would think so I lately as I take people

705
00:41:22,760 --> 00:41:25,920
Speaker 2: in there, the thing I say to them now is

706
00:41:26,000 --> 00:41:28,440
Speaker 2: let it overwhelm you. Don't be afraid to let it

707
00:41:28,480 --> 00:41:31,920
Speaker 2: overwhelm you, because that's really how you're going to experience it.

708
00:41:32,400 --> 00:41:37,080
Speaker 2: The painting is intended to be overwhelming. It's disruptive. All

709
00:41:37,080 --> 00:41:40,880
Speaker 2: the other paintings in the room, the fifteenth century side paintings,

710
00:41:40,920 --> 00:41:45,920
Speaker 2: the ceiling painting by Michelangelo, everything is compartmentalized, so every

711
00:41:46,000 --> 00:41:50,080
Speaker 2: single image within the side walls and the ceiling is

712
00:41:50,120 --> 00:41:55,600
Speaker 2: contained in some sort of pseudo architectural space. But the

713
00:41:55,719 --> 00:42:00,879
Speaker 2: Last Judgment just abruptly fills the wall with this incredible

714
00:42:01,000 --> 00:42:04,200
Speaker 2: Lapis Lazuli color. So the order that is all around

715
00:42:04,239 --> 00:42:08,480
Speaker 2: the rest of the room disappears and you're just consumed

716
00:42:08,640 --> 00:42:13,160
Speaker 2: by this mesmerizing Lapis blue sky where it looks like

717
00:42:13,200 --> 00:42:17,839
Speaker 2: the wall has dissolved and something supernatural is happening beyond it.

718
00:42:18,280 --> 00:42:20,920
Speaker 2: And at the lower part of the painting there's this

719
00:42:21,040 --> 00:42:25,279
Speaker 2: incredible rustle of movement of bodies, bodies lifting up from

720
00:42:25,320 --> 00:42:28,440
Speaker 2: the ground, Demons looking like they're trying to make a

721
00:42:28,600 --> 00:42:31,720
Speaker 2: move out to grab somebody from the crowd in the chapel,

722
00:42:32,120 --> 00:42:35,279
Speaker 2: people being cast into the depths of hell. But as

723
00:42:35,280 --> 00:42:39,000
Speaker 2: you move up a little bit, you begin to see

724
00:42:39,000 --> 00:42:42,920
Speaker 2: that the momentum of the painting is actually a momentum upwards.

725
00:42:43,200 --> 00:42:46,440
Speaker 2: So from the left hand side, another group of people

726
00:42:46,560 --> 00:42:50,440
Speaker 2: are drawn upwards, are being lifted upwards, are being helped upwards.

727
00:42:50,840 --> 00:42:53,799
Speaker 2: And then you find yourself gazing at the upper part

728
00:42:53,840 --> 00:42:57,919
Speaker 2: of the painting at this Winner's circle of Heaven, and

729
00:42:58,120 --> 00:43:02,680
Speaker 2: leading into the center is body after body of superheroes.

730
00:43:02,719 --> 00:43:05,360
Speaker 2: It looks like you're looking at a superhero movie with

731
00:43:05,480 --> 00:43:09,200
Speaker 2: these immense bodies. John the Baptist to Wait, Locust and

732
00:43:09,280 --> 00:43:13,320
Speaker 2: Wild Honey, who's flexing like mister Universe. You have Saint Peter,

733
00:43:13,440 --> 00:43:15,719
Speaker 2: who's looking like the buff ist seventy year old. You're

734
00:43:15,719 --> 00:43:19,960
Speaker 2: ever going to see these array of saints leading your

735
00:43:20,000 --> 00:43:22,400
Speaker 2: eye to the center, where you see Jesus like no

736
00:43:22,440 --> 00:43:26,760
Speaker 2: one's ever seen before, a powerful Jesus, a Jesus who's

737
00:43:26,800 --> 00:43:31,520
Speaker 2: not yet fully revealed his full strength and his full glory,

738
00:43:31,560 --> 00:43:35,920
Speaker 2: looking down towards the damned, raising his hand towards the damn,

739
00:43:36,320 --> 00:43:40,719
Speaker 2: about to unleash what looks like the terrifying justice of

740
00:43:40,800 --> 00:43:44,279
Speaker 2: the Lord on a sinful people. But then you look

741
00:43:44,440 --> 00:43:49,400
Speaker 2: slightly to his left and they're literally affixed to his side,

742
00:43:49,920 --> 00:43:52,000
Speaker 2: nestle to him in a way that has never been

743
00:43:52,080 --> 00:43:56,680
Speaker 2: done before. There is Mary looking down upon the elect

744
00:43:56,719 --> 00:44:00,680
Speaker 2: and they make this beautiful compliment to each other. Christ

745
00:44:00,760 --> 00:44:05,080
Speaker 2: is the picture of justice, Mary is the picture of mercy.

746
00:44:05,560 --> 00:44:08,440
Speaker 2: And again, if you are willing to brave the painting,

747
00:44:08,480 --> 00:44:11,359
Speaker 2: if you handle it that it's overwhelming you and you

748
00:44:11,440 --> 00:44:14,120
Speaker 2: let yourself be drawn up, and you feel that anxiety

749
00:44:14,160 --> 00:44:17,799
Speaker 2: at being caught up in something that is beyond your control,

750
00:44:17,920 --> 00:44:21,799
Speaker 2: which is the last judgment. You find yourself drawn to

751
00:44:21,880 --> 00:44:26,120
Speaker 2: that image of Mary, who leads you right to Christ's side,

752
00:44:26,520 --> 00:44:29,759
Speaker 2: and this indication that through her you get to him.

753
00:44:29,880 --> 00:44:35,520
Speaker 2: And there is a consoling voice, a comforting voice, an advocate.

754
00:44:35,000 --> 00:44:36,479
Speaker 3: For you in this incredible scene.

755
00:44:36,520 --> 00:44:39,239
Speaker 2: It's an amazingly beautiful, powerful work.

756
00:44:39,239 --> 00:44:41,520
Speaker 1: Of art, and in a sense that Mary in church,

757
00:44:41,520 --> 00:44:45,920
Speaker 1: which revolves in the following several centuries, Mary becoming a

758
00:44:45,920 --> 00:44:48,799
Speaker 1: central figure, Mary being mother of the church, and Mary

759
00:44:48,840 --> 00:44:51,759
Speaker 1: being the road through which we pray to be saved.

760
00:44:52,080 --> 00:44:55,399
Speaker 2: Absolutely, this is a moment where these Maryan themes are

761
00:44:55,800 --> 00:44:58,880
Speaker 2: very much coming to the fore, and so it shows

762
00:44:58,880 --> 00:45:02,120
Speaker 2: a Michelangelo who is sitting at the cutting edge of

763
00:45:02,200 --> 00:45:05,320
Speaker 2: Mary and theology. To put her in that particular position,

764
00:45:05,440 --> 00:45:10,279
Speaker 2: it's absolutely wildly innovative in its concept, and so it

765
00:45:10,440 --> 00:45:14,319
Speaker 2: creates this visual complementarity where you have at this sort

766
00:45:14,320 --> 00:45:18,080
Speaker 2: of center of the scene, you have man and woman together.

767
00:45:18,600 --> 00:45:21,279
Speaker 2: You have this image of Christ the Savior showing the

768
00:45:21,320 --> 00:45:25,120
Speaker 2: wounds on his hands for having saved redeemed mankind. But

769
00:45:25,239 --> 00:45:28,759
Speaker 2: at the same time we have that gentle conduit to him.

770
00:45:28,800 --> 00:45:30,720
Speaker 3: She's right by the wound in his side.

771
00:45:31,200 --> 00:45:34,800
Speaker 2: From whence the church sprang, we have that gentle conduit

772
00:45:34,880 --> 00:45:37,960
Speaker 2: of Mary to get to the presence of Christ.

773
00:45:38,680 --> 00:45:42,279
Speaker 1: When somebody has now experienced the Sistine Chapel and the

774
00:45:42,320 --> 00:45:45,799
Speaker 1: way you have described it brilliantly, and they now need

775
00:45:45,840 --> 00:45:49,600
Speaker 1: to contemplate what they've just experienced, what restaurant do you

776
00:45:49,719 --> 00:45:51,319
Speaker 1: recommend they go to contemplate it.

777
00:45:54,200 --> 00:45:55,879
Speaker 3: What a fabulous ending.

778
00:45:56,239 --> 00:46:00,239
Speaker 2: I'd go up the hill to Antiico Arco on the

779
00:46:00,239 --> 00:46:03,000
Speaker 2: top of the Jeniiculum, which is quiet. That's a nice

780
00:46:03,040 --> 00:46:05,439
Speaker 2: sort of quiet spot to contemplate.

781
00:46:06,000 --> 00:46:08,040
Speaker 1: And I know that you and Thomas have both become

782
00:46:08,520 --> 00:46:13,160
Speaker 1: certified somelie. So while you're being quiet and contemplating, do

783
00:46:13,200 --> 00:46:15,840
Speaker 1: you have two or three favorite wines you recommend?

784
00:46:16,600 --> 00:46:21,719
Speaker 2: So I think Thomas he would probably recommend a beautiful

785
00:46:21,800 --> 00:46:28,360
Speaker 2: red burgundy sand Nis, something fabulously complex with a rich bouquet.

786
00:46:28,680 --> 00:46:32,359
Speaker 2: In order to sort of imbibe all the richness of

787
00:46:32,400 --> 00:46:36,040
Speaker 2: the Cistine Chapel. I think perhaps I would go in

788
00:46:36,120 --> 00:46:39,719
Speaker 2: a more of either a white direction, a little bit

789
00:46:39,719 --> 00:46:45,160
Speaker 2: of a refreshing moment with the wonderful Veramentino, our fabulous

790
00:46:45,280 --> 00:46:49,240
Speaker 2: Mediterranean in a glass which we produce in the area

791
00:46:49,360 --> 00:46:54,280
Speaker 2: around Liguria and Sardinia, but actually visiting the Cistine Chapel,

792
00:46:54,400 --> 00:46:57,000
Speaker 2: visiting the ceiling, the last judgment, one of the most

793
00:46:57,040 --> 00:46:59,400
Speaker 2: beautiful places in the world. I would never say that

794
00:46:59,560 --> 00:47:03,160
Speaker 2: Champage aim is out of order, because everything about that

795
00:47:03,239 --> 00:47:06,760
Speaker 2: space makes us want to celebrate life, beauty in art.

796
00:47:06,920 --> 00:47:09,279
Speaker 1: Well, and on that note, I do want to point

797
00:47:09,320 --> 00:47:12,520
Speaker 1: out to people that I'll hear are you brilliant and fun,

798
00:47:12,880 --> 00:47:17,200
Speaker 1: but that you'd recently published The Silent Night, a history

799
00:47:17,200 --> 00:47:20,200
Speaker 1: of Saint Joseph has depicted in art, and that all

800
00:47:20,239 --> 00:47:22,600
Speaker 1: of your books can be found on Amazon, and we

801
00:47:22,640 --> 00:47:24,800
Speaker 1: are going to have, of course, on our show page

802
00:47:25,160 --> 00:47:27,359
Speaker 1: all of that information. Plus we're going to list your

803
00:47:27,360 --> 00:47:32,880
Speaker 1: website at www dot Elizabeth dashlev dot com so people

804
00:47:33,280 --> 00:47:35,520
Speaker 1: can be in touch with you and potentially if they're

805
00:47:35,520 --> 00:47:37,799
Speaker 1: coming to Rome, I think they now know from this

806
00:47:38,440 --> 00:47:41,160
Speaker 1: that you are a brilliant guide and that they will

807
00:47:41,239 --> 00:47:43,279
Speaker 1: not just learn a great deal, they'll have a heck

808
00:47:43,320 --> 00:47:43,959
Speaker 1: of a lot of fun.

809
00:47:45,640 --> 00:47:46,800
Speaker 2: Thank you so much.

810
00:47:50,080 --> 00:47:52,439
Speaker 1: Thank you to my guest Liz Love. You can learn

811
00:47:52,480 --> 00:47:55,200
Speaker 1: more about her tours of Rome and books on our

812
00:47:55,239 --> 00:47:58,680
Speaker 1: show page at newsworld dot com. Newtsworld is produced by

813
00:47:58,680 --> 00:48:02,279
Speaker 1: Ginglish three sixty and Heart Media. Our executive producer is

814
00:48:02,320 --> 00:48:06,480
Speaker 1: Guardnsei Sloman, our producers Rebecca Howe, and our researcher is

815
00:48:06,560 --> 00:48:09,600
Speaker 1: Rachel Peterson. The artwork for the show was creative by

816
00:48:09,640 --> 00:48:13,200
Speaker 1: Steve Penley. Special thanks to the team at Gingrich three sixty.

817
00:48:13,800 --> 00:48:16,120
Speaker 1: If you've been enjoying Newtsworld, I hope you'll go to

818
00:48:16,160 --> 00:48:19,560
Speaker 1: Apple Podcast and both rate us with five stars and

819
00:48:19,680 --> 00:48:22,160
Speaker 1: give us a review so others can learn what it's

820
00:48:22,200 --> 00:48:25,759
Speaker 1: all about. Right now, listeners of Newtsworld consigner for my

821
00:48:25,840 --> 00:48:30,200
Speaker 1: three free weekly columns at gingrich three sixty dot com

822
00:48:30,239 --> 00:48:34,080
Speaker 1: slash newsletter. I'm Newt Gingrich. This is Newtsworld