Blog #5

Gianlorenzo Bernini. Saint Teresa of Ávila in Ecstasy. 

I love Bernini.  He was and is the most amazing sculptor ever. There are so many other artists out there, but none that were as popularly commissioned and displayed like Bernini. I especially love this piece because of how he can make a block of marble look like thin sheets of cloth that are just barely staying in place. I would think that his work is very relevant to today's world because his pieces are tourist attractions for people all around the world, whether they know who Bernini was or not. I know that the only reason I would want to go to Europe is to go look at his sculptures. Also, the way that he approached his sculptures is relevant to todays artists, i think. Bernini could make his sculptures look like a real life scene, with emotion and human flaw, but you cant help but admire how perfect his work appears. Today, I think that there is a trend in current media towards portraying a more realistic vision of life, instead of trying to portray what should be happening or what someone else would want you to see. Bernini is definitely a trend setter with the accuracy and emotion he puts into his work, and you can see that his contemporaries and those who came to work after also tried to make their work as "real" as possible.

chapter 4's blog

Michelangelo's Last Judgement, Sistine Chapel.

When I read about this piece, I thought it was interesting that the church used the popular artists of the time to represent, through paintings, how the church viewed the various saints, stories and traditions they represented. 

With the Reformation, the Catholic church was being attacked because of its money hungry church officials. This was good for the church because it was forced to "change" and clean up it act of selling passes into heaven and such. So when the Catholic church started the Counter-Reformation, using the popular artists to paint more uplifting and promising pieces like this one was brilliant! 

I thought it was just like today when businesses need a kind of "face lift" to get consumers to fall back in love with their products. They simply pay a high profile celebrity or dump money into marketing campaigns, and if they're persistent  enough, the companies will raise profits and enjoy an increased consumer support. 

So, by Michelangelo taking part in painting the Last Judgement in such a way with the light, bright, beautiful colors and without the traditionally dim and intimidating look, the Catholic church was looking more and more appealing to their questioning patrons. 

All-in-all, i see this painting as a publicity stunt. but an amazingly beautiful one.