The March of Folly_ From Troy to Vietnam - Barbara Wertheim Tuchman [59]
In Michelangelo the Pope had recognized an incomparable artist from the time of his first sculpture in Rome, the Pietà, a requiem in marble which no one from that day to this can view without emotion. Finished in 1499 on commission from a French cardinal who wished to present a great work to St. Peter’s on his departure from Rome, it made Michelangelo famous at 24 and was followed within five years by his overpowering David for the cathedral of his native Florence. Clearly the supreme Pope had to be glorified by the supreme artist, but the temperaments of the two terribili clashed. After Michelangelo had spent eight months cutting and transporting the finest marble from Carrara for the tomb, Julius suddenly abandoned the project, refused to pay or speak with the artist, who returned to Florence in a rage, swearing never to work for the Pope again. What had taken place inside the dark truculence of the della Roveran mind no one can say, and his arrogance would not permit him to offer any explanation to Michelangelo.
When Bologna was conquered, however, the triumph had to have a monument by no other hand. After repeated and stubborn refusals and through the persistent efforts of intermediaries, Michelangelo was eventually won back and consented to model a huge statue of Julius three times life size as ordered by Julius himself. When it was viewed by the subject while still in clay, Michelangelo asked whether he should place a book in the left hand. “Put a sword there,” answered the warrior Pope, “I know nothing of letters.” Cast in bronze, the colossal figure was toppled and melted down when the city changed hands during the wars, and made into a cannon derisively named La Giulia by papal enemies.
In the Renaissance spirit, Julius’ Papacy, carrying on the work of his uncle Sixtus IV, poured energies and funds into the renovation of the city. Everywhere laborers were building. Cardinals created palaces, enlarged and restored churches. New and rebuilt churches—Santa Maria del Popolo and Santa Maria della Pace—arose. Bramante built the sculpture garden of the Belvedere and the loggias connecting it to the Vatican. Major painters, sculptors, carvers and goldsmiths were called on for ornamentation. Raphael exalted the Church in frescoes for the papal apartments, newly occupied by Julius because he refused to inhabit the same suite as his late enemy Alexander. Michelangelo, dragooned against his will by the importunate Pope, painted the Sistine ceiling and, caught by his own art, worked alone on a scaffold for four years, allowing no one but the Pope to inspect his progress. Climbing a ladder to the platform, the aging Pope would criticize and quarrel with the painter, and lived just long enough to see the unveiling, when “the whole world came running” to gaze and acknowledge the marvel of a new masterpiece.
Art and war absorbed papal interest and resources to the neglect of internal reform. While the exterior bloomed, the interior decayed. A strange reminder of ancient folly appeared at this time: the classic marble Laocoon was rediscovered, as if to warn the Church—as its prototype had once warned Troy. It was dug up by a householder named Felice de Fredi when clearing his vineyard of ancient walls in the vicinity of the former Baths of Titus, built over the ruins of Nero’s Golden House. Although the find was broken into four large and three smaller pieces, every Roman knew a classical statue when he saw one. Word was immediately