Britannica: “He led a mostly solitary life with few known intimate relationships.”
Gary Wilson: “He was never after the reality that the eye saw, rather he was chasing the ideal, the essence. What does a man’s spirit look like? What will your perfected physical appearance be through eternity? This was what Michelangelo was looking for: Spiritual proportions. Knowledge for Michelangelo was not an end in itself but a means to an end. Knowledge served the higher purpose of recreating the ‘true reality’ of the spirit man.”
Yiting Ge: “For Michelangelo, the arts and poetry expressed are praising a perfect world. It is believed that the ideal world is the real reality. Therefore, Michelangelo's artistic creation hopes not only to get rid of the shackles of the flesh and to move toward a more noble realm, but also hopes to show a perfect and harmonious spiritual world through artistic creation; it has deep philosophical contemplation, thinking about the universe and the soul. The questioning has great enthusiasm and perseverance. His philosophy pays more attention to the inspiration and neglects the external impression. He believes that matter is the blasphemy and prisoner of the spiritual world and it is necessary to obtain spiritual relief through tragic rebellion. The expression of neo-Platonism in Michelangelo's works of art is very common. The conflict between abstract speculation and artistic inspiration can often be seen in his works.”
Yiting Ge: “In general, the reflection of neo-Platonism in Michelangelo's works of art mainly reflectstwo aspects. On the one hand, Michelangelo believes that the ideal world is the real reality. The
opposite is the perceptual material world. Image, and all things are God's source, all levels under God are emulating the perfect character of the artist. In artistic creation and poetry creation, the
master pursues the highest perfection in the world of expression and chanting spirit, and this Anideal is also the ideological foundation of Michelangelo's neo-Platonic literary creation. On the
other hand, the impact of the small universe on Michelangelo’s influence is also very far-reaching.Michelangelo believes that artists can express the beauty of the concept world by depicting the sensual beauty of matter, while ‘man’ is the epitome of the universe, and it possesses reason. The soul, whether it is spirit, material or form, has reached a high degree of harmony, so Michelangelo is very obsessed with body art and pursues the noble realm of expressing his spirit with his body and strength throughout his life; but he also knows that only The soul was freed from the imprisonment of materialism to achieve the spiritual noble level. Therefore, the consciousness of the soul of reason in Michelangelo's later works is more and more obvious. Although Michelangelo hopes to achieve spiritual breakthroughs through artistic creation, he also hopes to reflect spiritual perfection and harmony through a perceptual beauty world. This seemingly contradictory proposition is precisely what Michelangelo formed about neo-Platonicism. With his unique insights and experiences, he hopes to find himself through the abstract idea of beauty and appreciate the pure beauty that people think of. Therefore, Michelangelo accurately interprets the human body and strives to accurately express the beauty of harmony. Through the methods of distorting and deforming, he expresses the symbolic meaning of the soul and gives his works more strength and soul reason.”
Yiting Ge: “Mentioned above, influenced by neo-Platonicism, Michelangelo hopes to be fully expressed through the beauty of art and eulogizes mankind with a rational soul. Michelangelo showed a strong neo-Platonism ideology, with the guiding ideology of ‘self-concentration of the soul and self-contemplation’. Drawing characters often have tension and torsion that are radiated from the inside out, and the soul has to get rid of matter. For example, Michelangelo's earlier representative painting ‘The Holy Family’ in his early paintings, Vasari referred to him as ‘a very fine and perfect work.’ The work was created by Michelangelo on the commission of Angelo Toni in 1503. As a traditional theme, it mainly depicts the Virgin, St. Joseph and the baby Christ, but in this work the three religious images are completely The way in which ordinary folk figures are presented shows that the work is a carpenter's family and reflects a secular and harmonious scene through the dramatic combination of three characters. The work uses a pyramidal composition, which is stable, powerful, compact and harmonious. The Virgin Mary sits back and highlights the spatial sensation of the characters before and after. The location of St. Joseph and the Holy Child is slightly higher, making the picture more layered. According to Michelangelo’s understanding of the beauty of the human body, it depicts the strong and powerful characters of the family. Even the nude young people in the background can see that Michelangelo’s fascination with body changes can be seen in Michelangelo’s Words, the human body is the best way to express beauty. Whether it is a meticulous external image or a coherent action performance, or the inner state of a character, is Michelangelo's display of beauty. This beauty is not only the beauty of the senses, the beauty of matter, but also the rational behind the balanced formal beauty. In Michelangelo China and the United States were endowed with infinite power, and Michelangelo integrated physical beauty and spiritual beauty in the human expression of reality.”
UK Disability History Month: “The artist was aloof and a loner. The artist’s mentor described Michelangelo as being unable to make friends or to maintain any relationship. He did not attend his brother’s funeral, which underlined ‘his inability to show emotion,’ writes Arshad.”
UK Disability History Month: “He was obsessed with work and controlling everything in his life — family, money, time. Loss of control caused him great frustration.”
Muhammad Arshad: “Michelangelo met the criteria for Asperger's disorder, or high-functioning autism. The evidence relates to his single-minded work routine, unusual lifestyle, limited interests, poor social and communication skills, and issues of life control.”
Getty: “Unlike most Renaissance artists, who learned about the human body from ancient sculpture and live models, Michelangelo participated in dissections. According to his acquaintance and biographer Ascanio Condivi, the artist first examined corpses in the convent of Santo Spirito in Florence when he was in his late teens. Michelangelo’s interest in anatomy did not extend to the organs but focused on the muscles and bones. His surviving anatomical drawings, like the ones exhibited here, attest to his thorough understanding of certain muscles, especially those of the limbs. The dissections enabled Michelangelo to grasp how the surface and contour of the body change when one moves. This knowledge was crucial for the creation of his renowned heroic nudes.”
Getty: “Michelangelo often drew the same form from various angles and introduced models made of clay, wax, or wood into his process, which enabled him to test his ideas in space.”
The British Museum: “After establishing the fresco's overall composition, Michelangelo worked out on paper the details of every figure in his complex design. Using a life model, he carefully explored each of the poses in studies full of the anatomical information he would need when painting. In time, Michelangelo made additional drawings of the heads and hands he tentatively sketched in.”
