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Michelangelo's Sistine Ceiling : A Portrait Of The Renaissance, Anne A. Ferris

Honors Theses

Because a single theological interpretation of the Sistine Ceiling cannot be made, the ceiling is a portrait of Renaissance concepts. Besides the personal struggles of the Pope and Michelangelo between 1508 and 1512, the ceiling is representative of the whole century before its creation. Michelangelo has mingled both civic and religious sentiments into the ceiling. Michelangelo has combined his experiences in the Medici circle with his personal beliefs. The ceiling with its most basic depiction of the fundamental concept of man's aspiration of redemption becomes almost a chaotic representation of the history of man, but which contrasts with the beauty …