Michael Angelo Buonarroti Part 12

Clement, who really seems to have had a regard for the artist, and wished to bind him to his interests, desired to provide for him for life. If Michael Angelo would have consented to make the vows of celibacy he would have given him an ecclesiastical appointment, failing that he offered him a pension. Michael Angelo only asked for fifteen ducats a month. Fattucci, on January 13, 1524, rebuked him for this modesty, and wrote that "Jacopo Salviati has given orders that Spina should be instructed to pay you a monthly provision of fifty ducats." A house also was a.s.signed to him at San Lorenzo, rent free, that he might be near his work. Stefano di Tomaso, miniatore, was Michael Angelo's right-hand man at this time, and his name continually recurs in the Ricordi. He was not altogether a satisfactory servant, and in April 1524, Antonio Mini seems to have taken his place.

This helps us to date the roofing of the sacristy of San Lorenzo, as in an undated letter to Pope Clement Michael Angelo says that Stefano finished the lantern and it was universally admired. This is the work of which it is recorded that when folk told Michael Angelo it would be better than the lantern of Brunelleschi, he replied: "Different, perhaps; but better, no!"

In the British Museum there is a drawing with a bit of advice to young artists, personified in his new pupil, Antonio Mini. It is in Michael Angelo's own hand:-

_Disegna Antonio, disegna Antonio, disegna e non perder tempo._

Draw Antonio, draw Antonio, draw and do not lose time.

And now in August 1524,(129) the Tombs of the Medici in the new sacristy were fairly under way. There are several preliminary designs in the Print Room of the British Museum, the Albertina at Vienna, and the Uffizi, Florence.(130) The first idea was for the tombs to be isolated in the centre of the chapel, but we gather from a letter, written in May 1524,(131) that it had already been decided to have mural monuments. The sarcophagi were to support portrait statues of the Dukes and Popes, of Lorenzo and his brother Giuliano. At the foot were to be six rivers, two under each tomb-the Arno, Tiber, Metauro, Po, Taro, and Ticino. The drawings go to prove that the architectural background, as we see it now, is as incomplete as it looks. Some of the drawings have elaborate candlesticks at the top; others a circular panel supported by putti. In several the first ideas for some of the final forms may be seen, but one point is very important: in almost every case the sarcophagi are large enough to support the figure or figures to be placed upon them, and never do we see that uncomfortable arrangement by which the figures appear to be sliding off their supports. Letters to Fattucci in October 1525, and April 1526,(132) give us an idea of the progress of the works. "I am working as hard as I can, and in fifteen days I intend to begin the other captain.

Afterwards the only important things left will be the four rivers. The four figures on the top of the sarcophagi, the four figures on the ground which are the rivers, the two captains and Our Lady, who is to be placed upon the tomb at the head of the chapel; these are the figures I mean to carve with my own hand, and of them I have begun six; and I have sufficient spirit to finish them in a convenient time, and bring partially forward the others which are not of so much importance." The six he had begun are those that are now in the chapel. The Giuliano and Lorenzo, Day and Night, Dawn and Evening. The Madonna, perhaps Michael Angelo's finest work in sculpture, was also carved by his own hand; the two other works, now in the chapel representing the patron saints of the Medici family, Cosmo and Damiano, were carved by Montelupo and Montorsoli; they do not seem to have anything of Michael Angelo about them, not even in design.

Meanwhile Francesco Maria, Duke of Urbino, the executor of Julius, was pressing the affair of the Tomb; he threatened a lawsuit to recover money advanced for the work. Michael Angelo appeals to the Pope in a letter addressed to Giovanni Spina, of April 19, 1525:-

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THE TOMB OF GIULIANO DE' MEDICI, DUKE OF NEMOURS

THE NEW SACRISTY, SAN LORENZO, FLORENCE (_By permission of the Fratelli Alinari, Florence_)

"It seems to me it is no good sending a power of attorney about the Tomb of Pope Julius, because I do not want to plead. They cannot bring a suit against me if I acknowledge that I am in the wrong; so I a.s.sume that I have sued and lost, and have to pay; and this I am disposed to do if I am able. Therefore, if the Pope will help me in this, as intermediary, and it would be the greatest blessing to me, seeing that I am not able to finish the said Tomb of Julius, both on account of my age and infirmity, he might express his will that I should repay what I have received for doing it, so as to release me of this burden, and so that the relatives of Pope Julius, with this repayment, may have the work done to their satisfaction by any one they like. Thus his Holiness our Lord could please me very greatly. Still, I wish to pay back as little as possible in reason. Making them listen to some of my arguments, such as the time spent for the Pope at Bologna, and other time lost without any payment, as Ser Giovanni Francesco, whom I have informed of everything, knows. As soon as I know clearly what I have to restore, I will make a division of what I have, sell, and arrange my affairs so as to repay all. Then I shall be able to think of the Pope's business, and work. If this is not done I cannot work. There is no way more safe for myself, nor more agreeable, nor more likely to clear my spirit. It can be done amicably without a lawsuit. I pray to G.o.d that the Pope may become willing to arrange it in this fas.h.i.+on, for it does not seem to me that any one else can do it."(133)

Michael Angelo had a wholesome fear of the law, not because he was guilty but because of the power of his antagonist. There can be no doubt that he was perfectly honest in these transactions, and, as Pope Clement said, he was rather creditor than debtor. Clement appears to have arranged matters to some extent with the executors, and we have a hint of the new arrangement in a letter by Michael Angelo to Fattucci,(134) dated Florence, October 24, 1525:-

"MESSER GIOVAN FRANCESCO,-In reply to your last, the four statues I have in hand are not yet finished, and much has still to be done upon them. The four others, for rivers, are not begun, because the marble was wanting, but now it has come. I do not tell you how because there is no need. With regard to the affair of Julius, I wish to make the Tomb like that of Pius in St. Peter's, as you have written, and will do so little by little, now one piece and now another, and will pay for it out of my own pocket, if I hold my pension and my house, as you have written; that is to say, the house where I lived yonder in Rome, with the marbles and movables therein. So that I should not have to give to them, I mean to the heirs of Julius, in order to be quit of the Tomb contract, anything of what I have received hitherto, except the said Tomb, completed, like that of Pius in Saint Peter's. Moreover, I undertake to perform the work within a reasonable time, and to finish the statues with my own hand." He now turns to his annoyances at San Lorenzo: "And given my pension as was said, I will never stop working for Pope Clement with what strength I have, though that be little, for I am old. At the same time I must not be slighted and affronted as I am now, for it weighs greatly on my spirits, and has prevented me from doing what I wished to do these many months; one cannot work at one thing with the hands, and at another with the brain, and especially in marble. 'Tis said here that these annoyances are meant to spur me on; but I maintain that those are scurvy spurs that make a good steed jib. I have not touched my pension during the last year, and struggle with poverty. I am alone in my troubles, and have many of them, which keep me more busy than my art, for I cannot keep a servant for lack of means."

There is a kind letter from Michael Angelo to Sebastiano del Piombo that belongs to this period, May 1525.(135) It refers to a picture by Sebastiano, probably the portrait of Anton Francesco degli Albizzi, referred to in letter cccxcvi.:-

"MY MOST DEAR SEBASTIANO,-Last evening our friend the Capitano Cuio(136) and certain other gentlemen were so good as to invite me to sup with them, which gave me very great pleasure, since it took me a little out of my melancholy, or rather folly. Not only did I enjoy the supper, which was very good, but I had far more pleasure in the conversation, and more than all it increased my pleasure to hear your name mentioned by the said Capitano Cuio; nor was this all, for it further rejoiced me exceedingly to hear from the Capitano that, in art, you are peerless in the world, and that so you were esteemed in Rome. If I could have rejoiced more I would have done so. So you see my judgment is not false, therefore do not any more deny that you are peerless, when I tell it you, for I have too many witnesses. And behold there is a picture of yours here, G.o.d be thanked, which wins credence for me with every one who can see daylight."

From the Ricordi we learn that Michael Angelo was busy with the Library of San Lorenzo. He had in his employ stone hewers and masters in various crafts: Tasio and Carota for wood carving, Battista del Cinque and Ciapino for carpentry, and Giovanni da Udine, a pupil of Raphael, for the grotesque decoration for the dome of the chapel. Clement added a postscript in his own hand to one of his secretary's letters: "Thou knowest that Popes have no long lives; and we cannot yearn more than we do to behold the chapel with the tombs of our kinsmen, or, at any rate, to hear that it is finished. And so also the library. Wherefore we recommend both to thy diligence. Meanwhile we will betake us (as thou said'st erstwhile) to a wholesome patience, praying G.o.d that He may put it into thy heart to push the whole forward together. Fear not that either work to do or rewards shall fail thee while we live. Farewell; with the blessing of G.o.d and ours.-JULIUS." (Clement signs with his baptismal name.)(137)

The Pope set Michael Angelo to make a Sacrarium for the relics belonging to San Lorenzo. It was placed above the entrance door of the church, and the details of that portion of the interior were altered for it. A design by Michael Angelo at Oxford is for part of these alterations. Another commission Clement desired Michael Angelo to undertake was of a curiously absurd character. Fattucci wrote to say that the Pope wished a colossal statue to be erected on the piazza of San Lorenzo, opposite the Stufa Palace. The giant was to top the roof of the Medician Palace, with its face turned in that direction and its back to the house of Luigi della Stufa. Being so huge it would have to be constructed of separate pieces fitted together. This project, evidently intended as a truly Florentine insult to the house of Stufa, did not please Michael Angelo, and his letter, of October 1525, in reply is an instance of his heavy, elephantine humour:-

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LORENZO DE MEDICI, DUKE OF URBINO

THE NEW SACRISTY, SAN LORENZO, FLORENCE (_By permission of the Fratelli Alinari, Florence_)

"_To my dear friend_ MESSERE GIOVAN FRANCESCO, _priest of Saint Mary of the Flower of Florence, in Rome._

"MESSER GIOVAN FRANCESCO,-If I had as much strength as I have had pleasure from your last letter, I should expect to carry out, and that quickly, all the things you write to me about, but as I have not I will do what I can.

"About the colossus of forty braccia, of which you tell me, that is to go, or rather to be erected, at the corner of the loggia of the Medician garden, opposite the corner of Messer Luigi della Stufa, I have thought of it not a little, as you told me, and it seems to me that it would not do in that corner, for it would take up too much of the roadway; but in the other corner, where the barber's shop is, it would turn out much better according to my way of thinking, because it has the piazza in front of it and would not be so much in the way; and perhaps as they would not allow the shop to be removed, for love of the income from it, I have been thinking that the said figure might be in a sitting position, and the seat high, the said work to be hollow within, as is right when working in pieces, so that the barber's shop would come underneath, and the rent would not be lost. And again, so that the said shop may have wherewithal to dispose of its smoke as it has now, it occurred to me to give the said statue a horn of plenty in its hand, hollow within, which would serve for the chimney. Then having the head of the said figure empty, like the other members, of that also I believe we could make some use, for there is here in the piazza a huckster, very much my friend, who tells me in secret that it would make a very fine dovecot. Another fancy strikes me that would be much better, but we should have to make the figure ever so much larger. And it might be done, for a tower is built up of pieces; and that is, that the head should serve as campanile for San Lorenzo, which needs one badly. And the bells hanging within, the sound clanging from the mouth, it would seem that the said colossus were howling for mercy, and especially on feast days, when they ring oftenest and with the largest bells.

"About the transport for the marbles for the above-mentioned statue, so that no one shall know of it, meseems they should come by night and well covered up, so that they may not be seen. There will be danger at the gates, and we must provide for it somehow; at the worst, we shall have San Gallo.(138)

"As to doing, or not doing, the things that are to do, and which you say may stand over, it is better to let them be done by those who will do them, for I have so much to do that I do not care to undertake more. To me it will suffice if it be something worthy.

"I do not reply to all you say, for lo Spina comes shortly to Rome, and will answer your letter by word of mouth, and more in detail than I can with the pen.

"Your MICHAEL ANGELO, Sculptor, in Florence."

This letter had its desired effect, nothing more was heard of the colossus.

The Sack of Rome in 1527 by the rabble of Germany and Spain, called the Imperial army, naturally stopped all artistic work, for war is the worst enemy of art. Clement was besieged in the Castle Saint Angelo for nine months, and the Medici lost their power in Florence. The Cardinal of Cortona, with the young princes Ippolito and Alessandro de' Medici, fled, and Niccolo Capponi was elected President of the Popular Government.

Michael Angelo was in Florence all this time. A Ricordo given in Lettere, p. 598, says: "I record how, some days ago, Piero di Filippo Gondi asked to enter the new sacristy at San Lorenzo to hide there certain goods of his because of the peril in which we now find ourselves. This evening of the 29th of April, 1527, he has begun to bring in certain bundles. He says they are linen of his sisters, and I, not to witness what he does, or where he hides the stuff, have given him the key of the said sacristy this said evening."

Upon July 2, 1528, Michael Angelo's favourite brother, Buonarroto, died of the plague. Gotti tells how Michael Angelo held his brother in his arms(139) while he was dying, notwithstanding the great risk to his own life, and took care of his family after his death. There are minutes of the expenses he incurred; the clothes were burnt to avoid infection; he repaid the widow Bartolommea her dowry, placed his niece Francesca in a convent until she was of an age to marry, and provided for his nephew Lionardo, as if for a son of his own.

The citizens of Florence, fearing the anger of the Pope and his new allies, now that their power was in the ascendant, prepared to endure a siege. Michael Angelo was appointed general over the construction of the walls and defences of the city in 1529. He had many difficulties with the council; often they objected to his plan of fortifying the heights of San Miniato. Michael Angelo went to Pisa and Arezzo to superintend the strengthening of the works there. He was sent also to Ferrara with letters from the Signori and the Ten to the Duke, the greatest Italian authority upon fortification, and to their envoy, Galeotto Giugni, who wrote to inform the Florentines that Michael Angelo refused to abandon the inn and receive the hospitality of the Duke, who with great honour personally conducted him over the fortresses and walls of Ferrara; no doubt at the same time showing him his art collections. It would be interesting to know if Michael Angelo looked upon the portrait-head of Julius II., broken from his Bologna statue, when the bronze was turned into a cannon. Perhaps he also saw La Giulia, the cannon herself. It may be that amongst the engraved gems in the Duke's collection was one representing "Leda and the Swan," and that Michael Angelo talked with the Duke as to the possibilities of this composition for pictorial treatment. Soon after Michael Angelo returned to Florence he received warning from a mysterious person that there was treachery in the garrison, so he fled to Venice. He had no idea of wasting his life uselessly when he thought certain destruction was before the city, and so he determined to leave Italy and accept the overtures that had been made to him from the Court of France.

The courage that fears not to undertake the greatest and most difficult works is of a different temper from that of a soldier, a bravo, or a Benvenuto Cellini; all the n.o.ble and virtuous qualities cannot belong to one hero. Unfortunately, the judgment of Michael Angelo turned out to be right after all. Nevertheless, hearing better news, and hoping against hope, he courageously returned to Florence in her extremity and went on with the fortifications. Some of the works at San Miniato still remain.

Vauban is said to have found them of such interest that he surveyed and measured them. During this sad time Michael Angelo laboured in secret at the tombs of the Medici. The sad and despairing thoughts of the artist are evident in the work he produced. No one can enter that solemn sacristy without feeling the spirit of deepest sadness brooding over all-Il Penseroso, and the figures of Day and of Night, of Morning and of Evening.

The city fell in August 1530. Marco Dandolo, of Venice, when he heard of it, exclaimed aloud, "Baglioni has put upon his head the cap of the biggest traitor upon record." The prominent citizens who escaped, including Michael Angelo, were outlawed and their property confiscated.

Many who remained in the city were imprisoned, tortured, and beheaded.

Michael Angelo hid himself, the Senator Filippo Buonarroti says, in the bell-tower of San Nicolo beyond Arno.(140) After the fury was over and Clement's anger abated, Michael Angelo, hearing a message of peace from the Pope, came forth from his hiding-place and resumed work on the statues at San Lorenzo, moved thereto more by fear of the Pope than by love of the Medici. During November or December his pension of fifty crowns a month was renewed, the Pope's agent in Florence being Battista Figiovanni, Prior of San Lorenzo.

In 1528 a block of marble had been a.s.signed to Michael Angelo, from which he determined to extract a heroic group of Hercules and Cacus. There is a small wax model of this composition at South Kensington, attributed to Michael Angelo, which may be for this design. The Medici Government handed over the blocks to the craven Baccio Bandinelli, who produced the horrible work, representing the same subject, now in front of the Palazzo Vecchio.

The Leda for the Duke of Ferrara,(141) but presented by Michael Angelo to his pupil Mini, was painted during the siege. It was probably a design from some antique gem in the Duke's cabinet. The original, and a copy by Benedetto Bene, were taken to Paris by Antonio Mini, where they pa.s.sed into the possession of the King. Michael Angelo's Leda hung at Fontainebleau until the time of Louis XIII., when a Minister of State, M.

Desnoyers, ordered its destruction, as it seemed to him to be an improper picture. Pierre Mariette informs us that the picture was only hidden away, and that it reappeared and was seen by him. It was restored and sent to England. In the offices of the National Gallery is the best edition of this picture. The head and arm are repainted, but the thigh and hip are modelled in a magnificent style that reminds us of the figure of Night in the Medician tombs that he was at this very time carving. From the power of this portion of the work we may a.s.sume that it is the damaged and much restored original by Michael Angelo.

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THE HEAD OF THE DAWN

THE NEW SACRISTY, SAN LORENZO, FLORENCE (_By permission of the Fratelli Alinari, Florence_)

Vasari informs us that about this time "he began a statue, of three cubits, in marble. It was an Apollo drawing a shaft from his quiver. This he nearly finished. It stands now in the chamber of the Prince of Florence, a thing of rare beauty, though not quite completed." This work was presented by the artist to Baccio Valori, the powerful agent of the Medici. It is now in one of the upper rooms of the Bargello, in Florence.

The rough hatchings of the chisel lines are everywhere visible; the figure is palpitating with life under a veil of hewn marble; the pose of the young G.o.d as he glides along and turns his head over his shoulder is one of the most beautiful and graceful Michael Angelo ever imagined. Until 1533 Michael Angelo worked at the Medici monuments. The ever recurring trouble about the Tomb of Julius distracted him in 1532; a new contract was made out in the May of that year, and Michael Angelo evidently expected that he would have to go to Rome about it. This may be gathered from the important letter written on February 24, 1531, by Sebastiano del Piombo, in Rome, to Michael Angelo, in Florence; it marks the renewal of the intercourse of the two old friends after the dangers and troubles they had pa.s.sed through during the siege of Florence and the sack of Rome.

Sebastiano's previous letter, as far as we know, is dated April 25, 1525:-