ABSTRACT
Late in 1533 Pope Clement VII conceived the idea of a new decoration for the altar wall of the Sistine Chapel. Perhaps, as one report of February 1534 has it, the subject was to be the Resurrection of Christ. The 'resurrectione' could refer to the bodies of The Last Judgement, twelve surviving drawings of the Resurrection make one wonder whether a smaller painting of that subject was not originally planned for the wall. Under Paul III The Last Judgement became the sole commission. The figures of The Last Judgement are more abstract and objectified than those of the ceiling, which seem to incarnate all of the youthful Michelangelo's hopes and fears. In this sense there is a Mannerism in The Last Judgement, a return to a kind of formalism that began with the Doni tondo and the Cascina cartoon. The Crucifix is one of the last of Michelangelo's highly-finished drawings, dating from around 1539.
