The Lost Battles: Jonathan Jones
Jun. 20th, 2013 07:26 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
poliphiloLeonardo was a bit of a sissy, Michelangelo a tough; Leonardo was a gun for hire, Michelangelo a patriot; Leonardo was a freethinker, Michelangelo a true believer. They hated each another.
The decision to give them walls to decorate in Florence's Great Council Hall pitched them directly against one another. Michelangelo's Battle of Cascina was a call to arms, Leonardo's Battle of Anghiari a pacifist manifesto. Neither picture was completed- and neither survives except in preliminary sketches and copies. Jonathan Jones uses this story of competition and confrontation as the focus for a wide-ranging exploration of the Florentine High Renaissance.
Nothing I've read about Leonardo and Michelangelo has ever given me such a clear and convincing idea of what these two sacred monsters stood for- and what they were like as people.
The decision to give them walls to decorate in Florence's Great Council Hall pitched them directly against one another. Michelangelo's Battle of Cascina was a call to arms, Leonardo's Battle of Anghiari a pacifist manifesto. Neither picture was completed- and neither survives except in preliminary sketches and copies. Jonathan Jones uses this story of competition and confrontation as the focus for a wide-ranging exploration of the Florentine High Renaissance.
Nothing I've read about Leonardo and Michelangelo has ever given me such a clear and convincing idea of what these two sacred monsters stood for- and what they were like as people.
