A Master’s Assistants: Michelangelo’s Sistine Ceiling

A Master’s Assistants: Michelangelo’s Sistine Ceiling
Detail of the Sistine ceiling's west end, showing pendentives and the Prophet Zechariah. Public Domain
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For almost four years it was a common sight on Vatican Hill. Between eight and a dozen men at their various tasks: Mixing plaster, using pick-axes to give a ceiling the rough surface which helped plaster stick, applying plaster and painting it.

Does that sound like an ordinary construction job? It’s actually how one of history’s greatest artistic masterpieces was created—Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel ceiling.

James Baresel
James Baresel
Author
James Baresel is a freelance writer who has contributed to periodicals as varied as Fine Art Connoisseur, Military History, Claremont Review of Books, and New Eastern Europe.
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