Michelangelo's Color Palette ColorTherapy

The Torment of Saint Anthony, Michelangelo

Unveiled last year at the Met — a painting ascribed to Michelangelo and one of only four known to be of his hand. According to The New York Times announcement, one of the telltale characteristics distinguishing his authorship was the palette, which suddenly made me appreciate the Sistine Chapel more, but now I’m running before my horse to market…

Michelangelo painted The Torment of St. Anthony at the ripe old age of 14, and this is considered to be his first painting. It was a copy of a widely circulated print of the period by Martin Schongauer, though of course Michelangelo lent it his hand. He added fish scales to a demon, gave the piece a distinctly Italian landscape beneath the figures and, of course, imbued it with color.

The palette features apple green, lavender, salmon and aubergine; the grotesques contain the pigments malachite, copper sulphite, vermillion and azurite, which give them a rich tapestry of textures. This is lovely in and of itself, but my mind immediately leapt to the palette of the Sistine Chapel, its controversial cleaning and restoration during the 80s and the broader context of the artist’s pursuits. I was one of those people who preferred the pre-cleaning colors of the chapel, which seemed umber and red sienna; the cleaned fresco was almost garish to me by comparison. But now I see it — the same palette of green, purple and salmon persists throughout a brilliant career.

But what might this have to do with interiors? When designing color for a home, I want all our final color chip choices to look good together in the hand. Why not this: green apple in the foyer, aubergine in the living room, salmon in the kitchen (ha!) and a lavender boudoir?

Possible color recommendations:
• From Benjamin Moore — Dark Basalt 2072-10, Luscious 1369, Golden Delicious 390, Old World 2011-40.
• From Ralph Lauren — Approaching Storm VM176, Salmon Pink VM50, Temptation VM43, Sage Sweater VM105.

Artwork info:
Michelangelo Buonarroti (Florence 1475 - Rome 1564)
The Torment of Saint Anthony, ca. 1487–88
Oil and tempera on panel, 18 1/2 x 13 3/4 inches
Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth
Photograph Courtesy The Metropolitan Museum of Art

- Mark Chamberlain, interior and decorative painter

To All ColorTherapy Posts

Re-edited from a post originally published 7.14.09 - JL

Comments (7)

Actually, the pre-cleaning tones of the Sistine Chapel reflect Michelangelo's intent far more than the colours after they removed his detailwork... to get his colour palette, sculptural would be the way to go.

(The "cleaners" removed a lot of Michelangelo's actual work. Frescoes almost never were completed entirely in the wet plaster, so were finished after the plaster dried. If he had done the whole thing in wet plaster, it would have been noted by art historians of the era, like Vasari. The cleaning removed all work that was done over the plaster itself.)

I will confess now to taking my Italian renaissance fresco textbook to the paint store when choosing colors for my new house (in a Mediterranean climate zone). I actually have an apple green kitchen, salmon living room, Naples yellow dining room and lavender bedroom :)

The colours in the Sistine chapel are much closer now to the tones in his three other known paintings in London and Florence..

http://www.italica.rai.it/rinascimento/iconografia/img/michel06.jpg

http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/michelangelo-the-entombment

http://www.rossettiarchive.org/zoom/op107.img.html

they influenced all the later Mannerist painters like Pontormo, Rosso or Fenzoni

"If he had done the whole thing in wet plaster, it would have been noted by art historians of the era, like Vasari. The cleaning removed all work that was done over the plaster itself."

First of all, not all frescoes had a secco (added to the dry wall) additions, and when they did, the additions were not done to change the overall color scheme of the painting, but rather to add details that could not be painted a fresco (in the wet plaster): gold leaf, ultramarine blue, etc. Secondly, if you are going to put faith in what Michelangelo's contemporaries say about it, then you should see Ascanio Condivi, who specifically says that Michelangelo DID NOT apply a secco additions. He tells the story that when the pope asked about adding the gold leaf, etc., Michelangelo didn't want to be bothered, and so told the pope that since the people depicted in the paintings were themselves poor, they should not have any rich embellishments.

Secondly, the restoration DID remove a secco painting added to the frescoes, but it was not painted by Michelangelo. How do we know? Because there was a layer of grime(from candles/lanterns) between the frescoes and the paint they removed. So, unless you believe that Michelangelo painted his frescoes, painted on a layer of dirt, and then painted a secco, the a secco paint was not painted by Michelangelo. And yes, there is a long tradition of other artists being asked to "freshen up" older paintings by painting over them.

I don't agree completely with the restoration of the Sistine Ceiling. But if we are interested in coloring, the colors as they are now are much closer to Michelangelo's intent than they were before the restoration.

Can we see the link to the New York Times article?

That St Anthony must have done something really bad.

The change is what we are not used to, soon enough we will be.