How Did Michelangelo Influence The Renaissance
Michelangelo contributed to this time period significantly through his thought provoking art by changing people’s views on art and artists. He did this through portraits of biblical characters and religious items such as churches, making his sculptures more manly with more muscle, and by engaging directly through the viewer with depth and storytelling.
Firstly, one of his famous works of art is the Statue of David. It’s a great piece but people were astounded/shocked by it as they have never seen an artist show David in such a way that he was portrayed as muscular. They were used to seeing him as a tiny, non-muscular man who should not have beat the tall, enormous giant Goliath but somehow did.. Michelangelo decided to step outside the box and show people his heroic side, him standing tall and muscular after defeating the giant, Goliath. As well, one of the things he is famous for is spending 4 years painting over 400 biblical chapters on the ceilings of the Sistine Chapel. People were in awe as some people had pictures in their minds of what some characters could look like but his paintings brought them to life and changed some of their images, as they didn’t have movies, TVs, or picture books to look at. The ceiling art was a proud part of their culture as one of their own built it. It helped develop the culture further as a lot of people in the time period were religious so it had been relevant to the time period.
Secondly, he liked to paint anyone muscular, including women and even children. There had been a reason behind this, as Michelangelo never liked being around women after getting a crooked nose after a fight in school. He had been always afraid of rejection and being laughed at. So since he has not been “close” to a woman, he drew them as men, and just added breasts to them. He always paid attention to detail, including the human body, which he learned when examining bodies from the morgue. So adding muscles were just basically another little detail to his fresco paintings. With detail like this in his art, it further improved his art and everyone else's art that he influenced and further strengthened the culture of the time period through precise, detailed work.
Lastly, he showed emotion through his sculpture named Pieta that shows Mary grieving over her son's corpse. This brought possibly some thought and emotion to religion in the Renaissance like why are we following in this faith if it hurt his mother like this etc. Creating pieces that will make the viewer think further in depth were starting to take place during this time period, and pieces like that played an important part in the culture of this time period. As well, he was the head architect of St. Peter's Basilica in his final years as well and helped create the dome. He not only designed the dome to make it look nice, he built it to give it thought and would it could mean. He said it was supposed to make viewers think it was a reconciliation between God and them. It was a proud part of their culture as not only one of their own crested these pieces, he put some thought into them as well and shifted to change how artists did their work.
In conclusion, Michelangelo contributed to this time period greatly by influencing artists and changing people’s view on art by stepping out of the box, the normal, for his work in the arts. He achieved this by showing biblical characters in ways we haven't seen before, making women muscular, and showing emotion through his paintings. With his art, he contributed to a cultural evolution by achieving success in his works and growing the arts in the 1500s. This is why Michelangelo had been an important figure in the Renaissance.
