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Collaboration: Sebastiano del Piombo
In 1516 Michelangelo discovered a brilliant artistic and political ally in the affable Venetian Sebastiano del Piombo. He provided Sebastiano with drawings to create pictures in competition with Raphael, the leading painter in Rome. This model of collaboration through a strong professional friendship with a younger artist -- here, a surrogate painter -- worked well for Michelangelo in his role as disegnatore (designer) in his later years. According to Vasari's biography, the friendship ended abruptly about 1533 or 1534, when Sebastiano all but insisted that the Last Judgment in the Sistine Chapel be painted in oil rather than the traditional medium of fresco.
This close collaboration presents fascinating issues of authorship. Crucial factors in identifying the drawings by Michelangelo are his Florentine design practices: the use of red or black chalk on white or neutral paper, the sculptural conception of form, and the forcefulness of the final contours. A brilliant draftsman, Sebastiano absorbed Michelangelo's monumentality of the figure, but stayed true to his Venetian training, choosing a pictorial handling of drawing media -- at times he almost painted on the paper -- and often using black chalk or charcoal on blue or gray paper. |