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The Significance of Michelangelo's Ignudi

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The Significance of Michelangelo's Ignudi
The Significances of Michelangelo’s
Ignudi

Michelangelo is largely acknowledged for being one of the greatest artist who ever lived. He was a master of many crafts such as sculpting, painting, architecture and engineering. He is widely known for his masterpiece that is The Sistine Ceiling. The ceiling is painted with decorative figures from particular Biblical stories. The most recognizable story is the nine scenes from Genesis that run from the altar to the entrance wall. What’s interesting about these paintings are the twenty Igundi that surround each individual scene. I will being by discussing Michelangelo’s ignudi poses and body structure. Then connecting Michelangelo's fascination with the study anatomy and how a Ignudo figure gives evidence to his interest. The twenty Ignudi figures are unknown, there is speculation about their meaning. Are the Ignudi merely just decorative elements or do they have a deeper significance? Are they Athletes of God, Symbols of Justice and Law or Symbols of beauty? Over the countless master pieces that Michelangelo produced, he was fixated on the Male body and its youthful dominance. Most of many models that Michelangelo used were youthful men. He would accentuate muscular curvature in the biceps, Forearm, stomach, legs and neck line. Scholars would argue that Michelangelo was homosexual, do to the many nude male figures and sculptures he had created. He rarely showed women as feminine and would use the male figure, such as this Ignudo at the upper left corner of the Drunkenness of Noah (above the prophet Joel). As you can see the only distinction between man and women can be only seen by the breast, hair and genitalia.

Michelangelo was fascinated by the study of anatomy. He began dissections in his early teens, when he joined the court of Lorenzo de' Medici. By his late teens, he conducted his studies by dissecting corpses then later applying what he had learned to his work. This helped him a great deal to show

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