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Tracing Michelangelo's Modani Mitteilungen Architecture, Design and Conservation Danish Portal for Artistic and Scientific Research Aarhus School of Architecture // Design School Kolding // Royal Danish Academy Tracing Michelangelo's 'modani' at San Lorenzo Foote, Jonathan Published in: Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz Publication date: 2019 Document Version: Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of record Link to publication Citation for pulished version (APA): Foote, J. (2019). Tracing Michelangelo's 'modani' at San Lorenzo. Mitteilungen des Kunsthistorischen Institutes in Florenz, LXI(1), 45-74. 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BAND — 2019 MITTEILUNGEN DES KUNSTHISTORISCHEN HEFT 1 INSTITUTES IN FLORENZ Inhalt | Contenuto Redaktionskomitee | Comitato di redazione Aufsätze Saggi Alessandro Nova, Gerhard Wolf, Samuel Vitali _ _ Redakteur | Redattore Samuel Vitali _ 3_ Daniela Bohde Editing und Herstellung | Editing e impaginazione Mary Magdalene at the Foot of the Cross. Iconography Ortensia Martinez Fucini and the Semantics of Place Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz Max-Planck-Institut Via G. Giusti 44, I-50121 Firenze Tel. 055.2491147, Fax 055.2491155 _ 45 _ Jonathan Foote [email protected] – [email protected] Tracing Michelangelo’s at San Lorenzo www.khi.fi.it/publikationen/mitteilungen modani Die Redaktion dankt den Peer Reviewers dieses Heftes für ihre Unterstützung | La redazione ringrazia i peer reviewers per la loro collaborazione a questo numero. _ 75 _ Teodoro De Giorgio L’invenzione dell’iconografia . Dai prodromi medievali Graphik | Progetto grafico in visceribus Christi RovaiWeber design, Firenze della devozione cordicolare alla rappresentazione moderna delle viscere di Cristo Produktion | Produzione Centro Di edizioni, Firenze Die erscheinen jährlich in drei Heften und könnenMitteilungen im Abonnement oder in Einzelheften bezogen _ 105 _ Margherita Tabanelli werden durch | Le escono con cadenza Echi normanni nel Palazzo Imperiale di Poznań. Guglielmo II quadrimestrale e possonoMitteilungen essere ordinate in abbonamento o singolarmente presso: e l’arte normanno-sveva, tra storiografia e prassi architettonica Centro Di edizioni, Via dei Renai 20r I-50125 Firenze, Tel. 055.2342666, [email protected]; www.centrodi.it. Miszellen Appunti _ _ Preis | Prezzo Einzelheft | Fascicolo singolo: € 30 (plus Porto | più costi di spedizione) Jahresabonnement | Abbonamento annuale: _ 135 _ Rahel Meier € 90 (Italia); € 120 (Ausland | estero) Wie kommt der Florentiner Dom in den Kapitelsaal der Dominikaner Die Mitglieder des Vereins zur Förderung des von Santa Maria Novella? Kunsthistorischen Instituts in Florenz (Max-Planck- Institut) e. V. erhalten die Zeitschrift kostenlos. I membri del Verein zur Förderung des Kunsthistorischen Instituts in Florenz (Max-Planck-Institut) e. V. ricevono la rivista gratuitamente. Adresse des Vereins | Indirizzo del Verein: c/o Schuhmann Rechtsanwälte Ludwigstraße 8 D-80539 München [email protected]; www.khi.fi.it/foerderverein Die alten Jahrgänge der sind für Subskribenten online abrufbar über JSTORMitteilungen (www.jstor.org ). Le precedenti annate delle sono accessibili online su JSTOR (www.jstor.org)Mitteilungen per gli abbonati al servizio. ____ 1 Michelangelo Buonarroti, profile studies for the Medici Chapel. Florence, Casa Buonarroti, inv. 10 Ar TRACING MICHELANGELO’S AT SAN LORENZOMODA NI Jonathan Foote Introduction an illuminating set of surviving , the natural or In an often cited passage, Giorgio Vasari praises full-scaled template drawings mademodani by Michelangelo Michelangelo for introducing novel cornices and for use by the San Lorenzo stone carvers to guide column base profiles at San Lorenzo, having finally details and ornaments.2 Comprised of eight paper “rotti i lacci e le catene” of Vitruvius, antiquity and and one large folio containing tracings, common use. “La quale licenzia”, he writes, “ha dato allmodani in the care of the Casa Buonarroti, modanithese drawings grande animo, a quelli che ànno veduto il far suo, di offer valuable, previously unacknowledged clues into mettersi a imitarlo, e nuove fantasie si sono vedute Michelangelo’s unusual approach to conceiving archi- poi, alla grottesca più tosto che a ragione o regola, tectural profiles and details.3 a’ loro ornamenti”.1 Widely studied since Vasari in Following a re-examination of these documents, terms of formal invention, Michelangelo’s extraordi- new assertions can be made about how Michelangelo nary implementation of architectural profiles seems generated his via a complex taxonomy of physi- to have had a close relationship with his working cal operations,modani whereby he used the themselves methods and techniques. To examine this, we turn to to produce new, altered . He reliedmodani on techniques modani 1 Giorgio Vasari, as “scale 1:1”, obscure the pre-modern significance of these types of Le vite de’ più eccellenti pittori, scultori e architettori nelle reda- , ed. by Rosanna Bettarini/Paola Barocchi, Florence drawings. zioni del 1550 e 1568 1966–1997, VI, p. 55. 3 The examined set encompasses: CB 61 A (Charles de Tolnay, Corpus 2 The vocabulary of terms used to indicate drawings of life-size or , Novara 1975–1980, no. 203); CB 59 A ( , dei disegni di Michelangelo ibidem natural scale is discussed later in the essay. Typical modern terms, such no. 204); CB 92 A ( , no. 525); CB 53 A ( , no. 534); AB, ibidem ibidem | 45 such as flipping and sliding to enable creative nego- E perché dal furor dello artefice sono in poco tempo tiations based on substitution, reversal, and stretch- con penna o con altro disegnatoio o carbone espressi ing, effectively utilizing them as paper tracing devices. solo per tentare l’animo di quel che gli sovviene, perciò Not incidentally, such processes were also at the root si chiamano schizzi.5 of Michelangelo’s exceptional approach to the antique lexicon, where conventions of module and moulding Then, he states, the sketches go through a period sequences were a source of figural deformation and of refinement, where “vengono poi rilevati in buona dismemberment rather than rote implementation. forma i disegni”, and finally, “misuratili con le seste o A number of now memorable sheets have fascinat- a oc[c]hio, si ringrandiscono da le misure piccole nelle ed generations of scholars in trying to understand maggiori, secondo l’opera che si ha da fare”.6 What this process; one of these is CB 10 Ar (Fig. 1), where becomes interesting is how the overturn this Michelangelo engages in a quick-witted mutation of strict mode of working, particularlymodani in the hands of an attic column base into a face profile. Normally, Michelangelo. A close examination of the documents the examination of Michelangelo’s profile generating will show precisely this: just as the encroach on process begins with his , or perhaps the built the technical domains normally associatedmodani with more work, but in this case newschizzi findings become available tentative stages in the project, i.e. , the imagina- when starting with the . The practice of making tive operations of are adoptedschizzi to some degree and Michelangelomodani’s idiosyncratic approach to from those of theschizzare . Recognizing the status of themodani profile line have only been tangentially connected; paper as a commonmodani support for both profile sketches however, in positing a stronger link between the two, and construction-ready templates, allow Mi- remarkable findings emerge.4 chelangelo to disrupt Vasari’s normativemodani definitions To help introduce this connection, it is worth re- and, almost literally, sketch in stone. Embraced be- calling that Vasari recounted a strict directionality tween a kind of chiasmus, where they are both from early ideas of the spirit, called “schizzi”, and and at the same time, but also neither, the modelli those that would be measured in compass and rule for take disegnion a critical capacity in Michelangelo’s concepmodani- implementation by others: tion of and innovation in the architectural profile.7 Gli schizzi, de’ quali si è favellato di sopra, chiamiamo Michelangelo’s modani noi una prima sorte di disegni che si fanno per trova- The extant encompass a period spanning modani re il modo delle attitudini et il primo componimento from 1523 to 1534, referencing the Medici Chapel dell’opra; e sono fatti in forma di una ma[c]chia e ac- and Laurentian Library at San Lorenzo (Fig. 2).8 Mi- cennati solamente da noi in una sola bozza del tutto. chelangelo’s from this period represent, in fact, modani XIII, fol. 157 ( , no. 536); CB 60 A ( , no. 527); AB, XIII, 6 , pp. 117f. ibidem ibidem Ibidem fol. 134 ( , no. 538); AB, XIII, fol. 127 ( , no. 539); AB, I, 7 The tension between drawings and models is captured in the etymol- ibidem ibidem 59, fol. 151 ( , no. 540). ogy of . Sharing a common root with , the variations on the ibidem modano modello 4 The specific meaning and interpretations of Michelangelo’s are term – , , – are all distinguished by the characteristic licenza modino modeno modono not taken up here. Rather, what is investigated is the physical processes use of ‘n’. A is described as a derivative of the Latin with modano modulus that are in support of such an approach. For an overview of the term in the the addition of a suffix derived from the Latin word , or grape- pampinus sixteenth century, see Alina Payne, leaf, suggesting a kind of ‘leaf-model’.
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