Michelangelo hid anatomical sketches in Sistine Chapel in Church attack

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/art/art-news/7833070/Michelangelo-hid-anatomical-sketches-in-Sistine-Chapel-in-Church-attack.html

Michelangelo hid anatomical sketches in Sistine Chapel in Church attack
Michelangelo concealed anatomical sketches in the robes and faces of the figures he painted on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in a coded attack on the Church's disdain for science, researchers believe.
Nick Squires in Rome
17 Jun 2010

The cleverly disguised drawing of a human brain, which has remained unnoticed for 500 years, may have been a coded reference to the clash between science and religion.

The Renaissance master, who painted the frescoes in the Sistine Chapel between 1508 and 1512, would have been familiar with what a brain looked like – he was an accomplished anatomist who is known to have dissected many corpses.

According to two American neuroscientists, the image of the brain is ingeniously hidden in the depiction of God's neck and chin in "Separation of Light From Darkness", which depicts the first act performed by God in the creation of the universe.

It is one of nine panels on the Sistine Chapel's ceiling based on scenes from the Book of Genesis.

Art historians have long speculated that the strange, lumpy appearance of the figure's neck may represent a goiter.

But Ian Suk and Rafael Tamargo, of the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland, believe instead that it bears a striking resemblance to the crevices and creases of a human brain.

"Stunningly, following Michelangelo's outline, one can draw into God's neck and beard an anatomically correct ventral depiction of the brain," they write in the scientific journal "Neurosurgery".

"We propose that Michelangelo, a deeply religious man and an accomplished anatomist, intended to enhance the meaning of this ... panel and possibly document his anatomic accomplishments by concealing this sophisticated neuro-anatomic rendering within the image of God."

They also believe that an odd-looking, vertical fold in the crimson robe worn by the figure of God represents the spinal cord, and that a mysterious Y-shaped fold at his waist may be an optic nerve.

Leonardo da Vinci had produced a detailed study of optic nerves 20 years previously in 1487, a study which Michelangelo may well have seen when the two worked in Florence at the same time.

The new thesis may explain something that has puzzled art critics for centuries – the peculiar lighting of God's neck.

Most of the fresco is illuminated from the lower left of the panel, but the neck is lit head-on and slightly from the right, casting different shadows.

Profs Suk and Tamargo argue that, far from being a clumsy error by Michelangelo, the peculiar angle deliberately enhanced the anatomical components of the brain.

By merging an image of God with a human brain, Michelangelo may have been seeking a covert outlet to show off his anatomical knowledge at a time when picking apart cadavers was frowned on by the Roman Catholic Church.

Alternatively, he may have been alluding to the wisdom of the Almighty or – more dangerously - hinting at his growing belief that ordinary Christians had the wit and intelligence to directly commune with God, rather than pray to Him indirectly through the Church.

That was an idea that would have been seen as heresy, particularly as the fresco is situated directly above the chapel altar.

Michelangelo's relationship with the Vatican became increasingly fraught during his career.

He fell out with Pope Julius II over payment for painting the Sistine Chapel, and came to loathe what he saw as the extravagance and vanity of the Church.

This is not the first time that medical experts have discerned hidden anatomical drawings in Michelangelo's work.

In 1990, an American doctor, Frank Meshberger, published a report in the Journal of the American Medical Association in which he suggested that a cross-section image of a brain was concealed in another of the Sistine Chapel panels, the "Creation of Adam".

Michelangelo 'hid secret code in Sistine Chapel'

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/2163492/Michelangelo-%27hid-secret-code-in-Sistine-Chapel%27.html

Michelangelo 'hid secret code in Sistine Chapel'
By Malcolm Moore in Rome
20/06/2008

Michelangelo hid a secret code in the frescoes of the Sistine Chapel made up of mystical Jewish symbols and insults aimed at the pope, according to a new book.

The ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, which the renaissance artist worked on for four years in the early 16th century, is actually a "bridge" between the Roman Catholic Church and the Jewish faith, according to The Sistine Secrets: Unlocking the Codes in Michelangelo's Defiant Masterpiece.

The book, which is already on the New York Times bestseller list, is the work of Rabbi Benjamin Blech, an associate professor of Talmud at Yeshiva University in New York, and Roy Doliner, a tour guide at the Vatican.

Scanning through the arrangement of figures on the vast 14,000 square foot ceiling, the authors have found shapes that correspond to Hebrew letters.

For example, the book states, the figures of David and Goliath form the shape of the letter gimel, which symbolises g'vurah, or strength, in the mystical Kabbalah tradition.

Kabbalah is a set of ancient esoteric teachings which are meant to decode the inner meaning of the Tanakh, or Hebrew Bible, and to explain the reasons for Jewish religious observances.

On the opposite wall, the scene showing Judith and her handmaiden carrying the head of the Assyrian general Holofernes is in the shape of the Hebrew letter chet, which represents chesed, or the characteristics of "loving kindness".

"There are so many layers of meaning on meaning, and most of it is from the Jewish tradition," said Mr Doliner on an American television programme.

Rabbi Blech added that all the figures in the nine scenes on the ceiling are Jews.

"He emphasises only Old Testament figures in the entire ceiling, and what he was trying to say was: Why have we ignored our true roots?" he said.

The book adds that the tree of life in the fresco is not, as usually thought, an apple tree, but instead a fig tree according to ancient Jewish tradition.

The authors believe the entire Sistine Chapel, which they say is built to the same proportions as the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, is a "lost mystical message of universal love" which was intended to be decoded.

The authors believe Michelangelo picked up his knowledge of Judaism while at the court of Lorenzo de Medici in Florence.

In addition, they say there are several attacks on Pope Julius II, who commissioned the work, embedded in the painting.

Disgusted with papal corruption, they think Michelangelo painted the prophet Zechariah in the pope's likeness.

Behind him, one angel is "making an extremely obscene hand gesture at the back of his head."

Critics of the new book point out that there is no record in Michelangelo's extensive and well-preserved writings of any secret code in the ceiling.

Dr Arnold Nesselrath, a curator at the Vatican museums said there was no way that Michelangelo could have painted any of the ceiling without the pope's express consent.

Marco Bussagli, an art history professor at Rome's La Sapienza university, said the revelation of "anti Catholic and anti-Christian" messages on the roof "suggests that the Dan Brown syndrome has struck again."

Mr Brown is the author of the controversial book, The Da Vinci Code, in which he writes that Jesus was secretly married to Mary Magdalene.

The two authors are not the first to have "seen" a secret Michelangelo code.

In 1950, a Venezuelan diplomat named Joaquin Diaz Gonzalez wrote a pamphlet arguing that an outline of the face of Dante, the poet, was hidden in the arrangement of the figures in the Last Judgement. He also "saw" a giant depiction of Jesus on the cross.

In 1990, Frank Meshberger argued in the Journal of the American Medical Association that the central panel, showing God and Adam reaching out to touch each other was in the shape of a brain and spinal cord.

In 2000, Dr Garabed Eknoyan saw the shape of a kidney in the painting, while in 2005 two Brazilian doctors found hidden body parts throughout, including a bronchial tube hidden in the tree trunk in the panel showing Eve's Creation.