Making a Masterpiece

Studies in World Art, Book 45

The creation of a masterpiece needs more than simply determination on the part of a single individual - though this, of course, is a myth that has continuously gained in strength since the time of Michelangelo. As Michelangelo himself well knew, masterpieces grow from a will to see them made on the part of patrons, who often play nearly as important a part in the process as the man who holds the brush or wields the chisel. The Sistine ceiling would never have come into existence had it not been for Pope Julius II, who in this case forced the artist to undertake a task he would willingly have put to one side, in favor of his real love, which was always sculpture.

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