Return to Glory

Darkened by centuries of grime and soot, Michelangelo’s paintings in the Sistine Chapel were cleaned in a painstaking process that began in the 1979 and lasted thirteen years - three times longer than it took Michelangleo to paint the ceiling. This 50-minute video documents the laborious cleaning process that brought Michelangelo’s frescoes back to their original glory.

If you’ve ever been curious about the process of restoration - its complications and complexities - than Return to Glory is for you. It provides a close-up look at the processes that were used by art conservators as they sponge-bathed each and every massive figure on the Sistine Ceiling. And it documents exciting discoveries made in the process. Splendidly colored figures formerly hidden by layers of dirt and grime emerge before your eyes.

Likewise, if it’s Michelangelo’s amazing capacity to render the human body that interests you, than this is a documentary film that you won’t want to miss. You can’t get this close to the Sistine Ceiling in a visit to the Vatican Museums, and you can’t begin to see the details that this video highlights - including a figure that bears Michelangelo’s hand print!

Return to Glory is currently out of print, but you’ll find copies in many public and university libraries. And, with a careful search, you’ll discover that there are some used copies floating around the internet.

Nippon Television Network Corporation, 1996. Distributed by CCC of America, Inc.

Michelangelo's Mountain

Here’s a brand new book that aims to give us the inside view on Michelangelo and his quest for artistic perfection - but this is not a book about the Sistine Chapel ceiling or the Pieta. Rather this book details Michelangelo’s quests for perfect blocks of marble in the quarries of Carrara in Northern Italy. Author Eric Scigliano presents a vivid picture of Michelangelo’s escapades and ordeals in the quarries that produced the marble from which the artist carved every single statue that he ever created.

Michelangelo’s repeated trips to Cararra - some lasting as long as eight months - gave him intimate knowledge of its mountain of marble. He spent his time there choosing the perfect blocks of statuario - marble fit for carving statuary - and supervising their quarrying and their transport to distant locales like Florence and Rome.

In writing this book, Scigliano shows his reader just how difficult and complex the task of quarrying marble was in the Renaissance, and he also demonstrates the extraordinary effort needed to produce the perfect block of marble.

Fortunately this book is not just about the quarries. It also covers the subject of Michelangelo’s scultpural work, with chapters discussing some of the artist’s greatest hits, like the David and the Pieta. Equally spellbinding are Scigliano’s descriptions of the enormous social and political challenges Michelangelo faced throughout his career, and his often troubled relationships with popes, princes, and poets.

Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling

By now, Ross King’s blockbuster book, Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling, is well known to many lovers of art and Rome-antics. But, just in case you’ve missed it, we want to remind you that it’s out there and that it’s well worth your time. It provides an excellent and enjoyable overview of the immense task undertaken by Michelangelo when he was commissioned to paint the Sistine Chapel ceiling by Pope Julius II.

It wasn’t Michelangelo’s first encounter with the formidable pontiff. Julius II had already asked Michelangelo to create a colossal tomb for him, then cancelled the project, an act that angered Michelangelo and made him swear never again to work for Julius. It was a promise that couldn’t be kept, however, for in 1508 Julius summoned Michelangelo to Rome and set him on the task of painting the Sistine Ceiling.

As King points out, Michelangelo was perhaps not the most logical choice for this project. His experience as a painter was limited, yet he was to produce a masterpiece that still attracts enormous crowds almost 500 years after its completion. The process by which the ceiling came into being is the subject of King’s book, but
it’s hardly a straight forward art history.

Rather, Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling should be considered to be a history of the Papal Court and its artists, for King aims to give his reader a complete picture of the social context in which Michelangelo worked. As a result, we learn much about the relationship between Michelangelo and the Pope; about the interactions between Michelangelo and the other superstar artists, like Raphael, working for Julius II; about the techniques and processes used by Michelangelo to paint the ceiling; and about the complex relationship that Michelangelo maintained with his family in Florence.