ミケランジェロの「ピエタ」　３作品が初めて一堂に　伊

【フィレンツェＡＦＰ＝時事】バチカンのサンピエトロ大聖堂にある聖母子像「ピエタ」は、イタリア・ルネサンス期の巨匠ミケランジェロの傑作と称賛されているが、ミケランジェロは他にもピエタ像を残している。（写真はミケランジェロ作「フィレンツェのピエタ」。伊フィレンツェのドゥオーモ付属博物館で）
　伊フィレンツェにあるドゥオーモ付属博物館で今週から、ミケランジェロが手掛けたピエタ像３作品を初めて一堂に集めた展覧会が開催されている。
　同美術館所蔵の「フィレンツェのピエタ」に加え、バチカン美術館から貸し出された「サン・ピエトロのピエタ」と「ロンダニーニのピエタ」それぞれの複製の計３点だ。
　ピエタとは、聖母マリアが息子イエス・キリストの遺体を抱きかかえ、その死を嘆いている姿を表現する主題を指す。
「サン・ピエトロのピエタ」は、ミケランジェロがまだ２５歳にもならないときに完成させた作品で、同時代の人々は、うねるようなドレープに身を包んだ聖母の美しさに目を奪われた。１９７２年には見学者によって一部が破壊され、修復後は防弾ガラスで保護されている。
　「フィレンツェのピエタ」は、ミケランジェロが７２歳の時に制作が開始された。うつ状態に苦しんでいたこの頃のミケランジェロは死が近いことを確信し、清貧の誓いを立て、信仰を生活の中心としていた。この像はミケランジェロ自身が出来栄えに満足できずに一部を破壊したとされ、修復後もその痕跡が残っている。
　「ロンダニーニのピエタ」は１５５２年頃、８０歳を前にして手掛けた作品。高さ約２メートルの驚くほどモダンな裸像で、ミケランジェロが１５６４年に８８歳で亡くなるまで制作を続けていたローマの自宅で発見された。
　ドゥオーモ付属博物館のティモシー・バードン館長は、この３作品を並べることで「最初のピエタ像から他の２作品を制作するまでの５０年間にミケランジェロの作風がいかに進化したかという点と、最後の２作品の間にあるより大きな変化を検証することができる」と述べている。
　会期は８月１日まで。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2022/02/28-10:49）

It is admired the world over as an exquisite depiction of maternal grief. But Michelangelo's Pieta has overshadowed two other moving sculptures on the same subject by the Renaissance giant.
That is why Florence's Opera del Duomo museum in Italy is putting on display together for the first time all three versions of the Virgin Mary mourning over the body of her son Jesus Christ.
The Tuscan museum's original Bandini goes on show Thursday alongside casts of the Pieta and Rondanini, which are on loan from the Vatican Museums.
Positioned to face each other in an intimate setting, there are striking contrasts between these variations, which mark different phases in the life of the artist, who died aged 88 in 1564.
The museum's director, Timothy Verdon, said it was a unique opportunity to observe Michelangelo's intellectual maturation on the theme of the sacred.
The exhibition, which runs until August 1, highlights the link between life and art in this religious sculptor, who served the popes for most of his career.
- Purity -
The Pieta housed at the Vatican -- masterfully executed when Michelangelo was not yet 25 years old -- amazed his contemporaries, who were dazzled by the beauty of this virgin, clothed in billowing drapery.
The artist rejected criticism that his Mary was too youthful, saying purity kept women beautiful.
Mary cradles her 33-year old son, whose serene expression suggests he could almost be sleeping in a nod to the coming resurrection -- the rising of Jesus from the dead in Christian belief.
This sculpture was damaged by a Hungarian hammer-wielding attacker in 1972, and the restored work of art is now protected behind bulletproof glass.
Centuries earlier, Michelangelo himself -- dissatisfied with the Bandini, his second pieta -- attacked it with a hammer, leaving marks which can still be seen today on Jesus' shoulder and Mary's hand.
This version was done when the then-72-year old artist was suffering from depression. Convinced death was near, Michelangelo took a vow of poverty and placed religion at the centre of his life.
He lent his own features and beard to the character of Nicodemus, who dominates the Bandini, shielding Jesus, Mary Magdalene and Mary, who here has lost her earlier timeless beauty.
- Evolution of style -
The Rondanini is without doubt the most surprising: stunningly modern, this stripped-down sculpture, about two metres high, was begun around 1552, when the artist was nearly 80 years old.
It was found in his home in Rome, where he worked until his death.
Juxtaposing the three works allows us to measure the evolution of Michelangelo's style over the 50 years that separate the first pieta from the other two, and the even more drastic and striking change between the last two, said Verdon.
The last pieta feels unfinished and far removed from the aesthetic canons of the time, but experts also see it as a message of faith and the importance of looking beyond appearances to the essential.
Gone is the rich drapery, gone are the supporting characters.
Mary and her son, whose faces and bodies are reduced to sketches, are once again represented alone in an extreme simplicity that reinforces the spiritual power of Michelangelo Buonarroti's last work.