Sun-symbolism and cosmology in Michelangelo's Last Judgment

[摘要] Although the perception of the design of Michelangelo's Last Judgment asdependent upon a basically circular composition around the figure of Christ hasgenerally been observed in the literature, no sailsfactory explanation of this hasbeen presented. In the following hypothesis, a cosmological interpretation ofMichelangelo's Last Judgment proposes new sources for the circular design of thefresco around a central Apollonian Sun-Christ.After. an outline of the basic nature of the problem, an examination ofearlier examples of the Last Judgment demonstrates the cosmological associationsof the traditional iconography of the subject, primarily related to the hierarchicalimplications! of the 'flat-earth theory,' which places Heaven above and Hellbeneath the earth's surface. Close formal analysis of Michelangelo's own versionof the Last Judgment, which emphasizes the innovative aspects of its organisation,is then followed by an assessment of various existing interpretations of the work.In then examining the type of Sources which appear likely to have contributed tothe final programme of the work, different areas of religious, literary andphilosophical material are brought under consideration.In order to resolve the meaning of the fresco's iconography andcomposition, the influences upon Michelangelo of the Catholic religion andReform thought, of the writings of Dante, and of Florentine Neoplatonism havebeen examined in an entirely new way, from a cosmologicalpoint of view, whichbrings to light their common emphasis on the Sun as a eymbol of the Deity. Anew area of potential source material, that of contemporary scientific cosmology,has also been considered. Prevailing knowledge of Copernicus' theory of theSun-centred universe, hitherto dismissed as a possible direct influence byrenowned writers like Charles de Tolnay, on the grounds of chronology, isspecifically discussed and found to be securely documented in Vatican circles atthe time of the commission. Thus the sources finally proposed for the overalltheme of Sun-symbolism and Cosmologyin the fresco are found to 'be dependentupon the common. ground shared between the Catholic Reformation revival of thetraditional Christian analogy between the Deity and the Sun, the Neoplatoniccult of Sun-symholism, literary sources in Dante and the scientific theory ofheliocentricity, as developed by Copernicus.Against this background of the History of Ideas in the Renaissance period,consideration of art historical methods leads to the suggestion of a newly proposedBiblical source for the fresco and, finally)l discussion of the deductive method ofart historical intterpretation suggests the broader implications of the hypothesls, Iiboth for the life and work at Michelangelo himself as well as for the/!sixteenth-century 'context of the fresco's creation.

[发布机构] University of the Witwatersrand