A lesson learned from MICHELANGELO: A LIFE IN SIX MASTERPIECES, by Miles Unger

Every great artist needs both the freedom to follow their visions, and the pressure to eventually complete them.

    Of all the fields of History I have studied in my decades of loving the topic, my knowledge of Art History has always been sadly limited. Partly this is my own lack of artistic vision; from my earliest academic days, my strength has always been in reading and writing, and not so much in any sort of visual talent or appreciation of what one looked like. To that end, I was well aware that the Renaissance artists were great men who made timeless artistic masterpieces, yet I knew very little about their lives or the details of what their art meant to them. Having discovered Miles Unger's 2014 study of Michelangelo: A Life in Six Masterpieces, I have a new appreciation for what the man accomplished, as well as an understanding of the complexities of dealing with tortured artists, many of whom have ambitions they could never accomplish without outside deadlines and discipline being imposed on them.

    I know there is a never-ending battle in art between giving artists complete freedom to follow their dreams and craft their work, and the practical realities that people pay for art and expect even the greatest of works to eventually be completed and appreciated by the masses. That made Michelangelo's story somewhat familiar, as he in many ways perfectly fit modern stereotypes of tortured artists. He was man who I found easy to admire and pretty difficult to like. A deeply religious man who was humble as to his own place in history, he was also damn well aware he was a world renowned sculptor, and lorded that fact over others as he fought for commissions and threatened to bail on projects that were not being supported to his liking. He liked working with lowly assistants and had a lifelong sympathy for the poor and oppressed masses of Europe, but he also held both the rulers funding his work and his fellow artists in utter contempt, with a special hostility toward artists such as Leonardo and Raphael whom people saw as his competitors (I of course must reference Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles; ironically, the actual Leonardo [by all accounts a friendly and affable man] had much more in common with the Turtles' version of Michelangelo, whereas the actual Michelangelo has largely a brooding and antisocial man). Unger's book studies Michelangelo's life through his various artistic masterpieces, connecting them to the larger political events happening around Italy as Michelangelo worked. Over his long (88 years!) life, Michelangelo outlived all his artistic rivals and saw various leaders and popes rise and fall, maintaining his position throughout his life largely by dodging political debates and battles around him (some saw him as brilliantly pragmatic, others as something of a coward). Ironically, Michelangelo saw himself as a master sculptor but only a modestly talented painter, which made his crowning achievement of the Sistine Chapel all the more impressive and fascinating.

    Unger's book is somewhat dense and will certainly be more fascinating to art historians, but it is readable for the layman (of which I myself am more of one on this subject), and some of its angles on Michelangelo's art are fascinating (you can guess all manner of modern assumptions we can make about his obsession with nude male art pieces, and his lifelong avoidance of women). But in terms of historical lessons, one major takeaway I had was the need for there to be a balance in the world's support for artists. The arts in the modern world are tragically underfunded and underappreciated, and in our world drowning in AI slop it's anyone's guess how many Michelangelos are struggling to even get noticed and make ends meet (I know a few great ones myself)! But then again, one struggle a perfectionist like Michelangelo encountered was that he was so obsessed with creating masterpieces, he could spend years and even decades on them, and that led to ambitious artistic fantasies that he would never be able to finish in his lifetime. To some extent, Michelangelo needed the pressure of deadlines and patrons checking in on him, reminding him they expected their commissions to eventually be finished, or he might have wasted his talent laboring on a few efforts that were never really completed (to some extent, Leonardo and all his unfinished masterpieces fell into this trap). The world needs great artists to inspire us and remind us of all the beautiful things humanity can accomplish, even if every now and then they need a nudge in the right direction.