The Meaning of Michelangelo's Medici Chapel 1

The enigma of Michelangelo’s unfinished Medici Chapel in San Lorenzo in Florence, given the host of preparatory drawings and attendant documents, has exercised a magnetic fascination over the scholarship of the past century and a half ² . I would scarcely presume to contribute still another interprétation had I not been impressed by the fact that many of the previous attempts distorted Michelangelo’s autograph remarks on the meaning of the figures, some ignored them altogether, and one even set aside an explanatory phrase by Michelangelo as merely “playful” ³ . Moreover sufficient attention has not yet been paid to the purpose for which the chapel was intended, the historical conditions surrounding it, and the three centuries of tradition, commencing in the circle of Michelangelo, during which the chapel was understood as a grandiose allegory of princely and papal power ⁴ .