The Ugly Renaissance Read Online Free PDF Page A

antiquity to create both cities and societies that were themselves works of art.
    But this is exactly where the paradox lies. It’s not that the implication of cultural and artistic “rebirth” is necessarily useless or invalid but rather that attempts to define the Renaissance in such terms inevitably exclude more than they include. In succumbing to the “great men” myth, the familiar definition of the Renaissance tends to exclude the everyday, the visceral, the sordid, and the distasteful. It tends to abstract literature and the visual arts from ordinary existence, as if it were possible to regard them as entirely distinct spheres of existence. It overlooks the fact that even the greatest artists had mothers, got into scrapes, went to the toilet, had affairs, bought clothes, and were occasionally very unpleasant people. It ignores the fact that Michelangelo had his nose smashed in for being cocky.
    The result is a one-sided and incomplete image of what was undoubtedly a rich and profoundly “human” age. It effectively misrepresents entirely consistent human beings as conflicted or paradoxical figures when their artistic achievements appear to clash with decidedly down-to-earth characters. It leaves historians anxious for order and meaning with no option but to set aside whatever traits seem inconvenient—usually the most ordinary. In other words, by giving way to our comfortable old view of the Renaissance, we end up accepting Michelangelo the artist but dismissing Michelangelo the man.
    There is no immediate need to offer a completely new definition of the Renaissance as a whole. But if Michelangelo’s broken nose illustratesanything, it shows that the Renaissance can really be understood only when it is viewed as a whole—vicious brawls and all. In order to comprehend how Michelangelo was able to create so perfect a synthesis of classical and naturalistic elements in his sculpture at the same time as he was having his nose broken in idiotic fights, it is necessary to recognize that these were two interrelated dimensions of the same, all-too-human person and that the age in which he lived was similarly composed not just of soaring cultural achievements but also of seamy, boorish, violent, and deeply unpleasant trends. Put simply, if the Renaissance is going to be understood, Michelangelo must be put back into his real-life social context, and the swirling social world that gave birth to the man and the artist must be brought into focus. The “Renaissance” needs to be viewed not as it is conventionally seen but as the ugly Renaissance it was.

    Returning to the beginning, therefore, it’s clear that a pause needs to be made at exactly the moment at whichPietro Torrigiano’s fist crashed into Michelangelo’s nose. The bloodcurdling sound of bone and cartilage cracking is an occasion to stop and reconsider. As Michelangelo is left slumping to the ground, familiar ideas of the Renaissance also begin to fall away as a search is launched for the world that made it possible for this adolescent both to scale the heights of artistic genius and to plumb the lows of public brawling. This key moment must be approached afresh by imaginatively zooming out of Santa Maria del Carmine. First, it is important to look at Florence as a whole, and uncover the sights, sounds, and smells of the streets and squares. Only then will the dramas of social life that provide the immediate context for Michelangelo’s fight gradually come to light. After a survey of the dramatic history of the institutions that frame the world of Renaissance art—business, politics, and religion—the world of home life and the inner workings of everyday existence in contemporary Florence will be examined, and the surprisingly ordinary, often rather sordid, concerns that filled Michelangelo’s thoughts as he embarked on his career as an artist can be reconstructed. And finally, Michelangelo’s mind itself can be opened up to examine how the swirling