Michelangelo's 'Presentation Drawings'
By Martin Clayton, Head of Prints and Drawings
Reading time: 6 minutes
Michelangelo was born in 1475 in Caprese in south-east Tuscany and died in Rome shortly before his 89th birthday in 1564. During his long career, he produced some of the greatest paintings, sculpture and architecture of all time. Some of his masterpieces include the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, the marble David, and the dome of St Peter’s Basilica. But alongside his imposing public works, Michelangelo also created ‘presentation drawings’. These are intimate, highly-finished drawings that Michelangelo made as gifts for his closest friends.
Today, many of these presentation drawings are in the Royal Collection. They are unsurpassed examples of draughtsmanship, executed only with sharpened pieces of red or black chalk. They are also sophisticated expressions of Michelangelo's beliefs about the nature of human life, which is beset by trials and tormented by passions. In many of his drawings, Michelangelo conveyed the idea of divine love as the only hope of salvation.
Michelangelo's gifts for Tommaso
Michelangelo made the most elaborate of these drawings as gifts to the young Roman nobleman, Tommaso de’ Cavalieri, whom he first met in 1532. Michelangelo fell deeply in love with Cavalieri, writing to him of the ‘ocean with overwhelming waves that has appeared before me’. Though the first flush of passion subsided in time, they remained close friends until the end of Michelangelo’s life.
Michelangelo’s first two drawings for Cavalieri were depictions of the myths of Tityus and Ganymede. They were probably sent as New Year’s gifts. In a letter to the artist, dated 1 January 1533, Cavalieri stated that he spent two hours each day poring over the drawings.
The first drawing depicts the punishment of the giant Tityus for attempting to rape Latona, the mother of Apollo. Tityus was condemned to be chained to a rock in Hades (hell) for eternity. Each day a vulture would tear out his liver, thought to be the source of lust, but every night the liver would grow back. The torment would then be repeated the next day. Though the scene is one of damnation, Michelangelo drew the degenerate giant with a heroic muscular body and an expression of fortitude rather than agony.
The companion drawing of Ganymede is lost, but the composition is known from early copies, such as this example by Giulio Clovio. Here, the beautiful shepherd-boy Ganymede is carried heavenwards by the god Jupiter, who has transformed into an eagle.
The Tityus and Ganymede drawings were intended to be seen as a pair, each depicting a nude dominated by a huge bird. But more profoundly, they represent opposed forms of love. Tityus embodies the carnal lust that leads to earthly suffering, whereas Ganymede represents the spiritual love that leads to the Divine.
Later in 1533, Michelangelo executed two more elaborate drawings for Cavalieri – The Fall of Phaethon and A Children's Bacchanal. In mythology, Phaethon was granted any wish by his father Apollo, the sun god. He demanded to drive his father’s horse-drawn sun chariot for one day, but he soon lost control. The horses pulled the chariot too high, and the earth froze, then too low and the land was scorched. To save the earth, Jupiter struck Phaethon from the heavens with a bolt of lightning.
Michelangelo’s drawing presents different episodes in the story of Phaethon’s fall. Above, Jupiter sits astride his eagle ready to throw a lightning bolt. At the centre, Phaethon falls to earth with the chariot and horses while his sisters grieve his death below. The myth is an example of the punishment for excessive pride or self-confidence, and may reflect Michelangelo’s feelings of unworthiness in daring to love someone so beautiful as Cavalieri. Learn more about The Fall of Phaethon in our Collection Online.
A Children’s Bacchanal is more complex, and its relevance to Michelangelo’s love for Cavalieri less obvious. In a cave, children struggle to carry a dead deer towards a cauldron. In the upper right corner, other children drink from a wine vat, while one urinates into a bowl that will soon be offered to his friend. Below, an aged satyr-woman suckles a child, and a man slumps in sleep or a drunken stupor. The drawing represents the most basic level of existence – in the absence of reason and divine love, the children are driven solely by natural urges and act in an animal-like fashion.
Gifts for unknown recipients
Alongside these four drawings for Cavalieri, Michelangelo made several other elaborate drawings in the early 1530s, whose recipients are unknown. These include the Labours of Hercules, representing three of the mythological hero’s challenges. At left, is the slaying of the Nemean lion, whose coat could not be penetrated by Hercules’ arrows. In the centre, is the killing of the giant Antaeus, who derived his strength from contact with the earth, and so Hercules lifted him into the air before crushing him. And at right, Hercules struggles with the Hydra, the many-headed monster that grew two heads for each that was cut off. Read more about the Labours of Hercules in our Collection Online.
The drawing of Archers Shooting at a Herm depicts a group of figures posed as if firing arrows at a shield fixed to a herm (a column with the upper half in human form). Strangely, their bows are absent, though arrows are seen stuck into the target and elsewhere on the herm – their aim has been conspicuously poor. In the lower half of the drawing, a winged Cupid, the god of love, is sleeping with his bow and arrows, while to the left, two children kindle a fire.
This imagery of the flames of passion and the arrows of desire was common in the Renaissance. The meaning is plain: only those guided by divine love will succeed. The Archers distinguishes between two forms of love – physical desire and divine love. The child-god Cupid is sleeping and unable to guide the archers, but without divine love, they cannot hit their target. Instead, the archers are driven by the flames of passion, and the arrows miss their mark. Learn more about Archers Shooting at a Herm in our Collection Online.
Famous across Europe
Though Michelangelo's presentation drawings were made as private gifts, they were immediately famous. After receiving the Fall of Phaethon, Tommaso de’ Cavalieri wrote to Michelangelo that ‘it has been seen by the Pope, Cardinal de’ Medici, and everyone’. Although he treasured them to the end of his life, Cavalieri made the drawings available for others to copy, both in replica drawings and in engravings. As a result, their fame spread throughout Europe.
It is surprising, therefore, that the route of these drawings into the Royal Collection is a mystery. When Cavalieri died in 1587, his presentation drawings passed into the collection of the noble Farnese family, after which, the trail goes cold. For the next 200 years, the drawings are not mentioned in any known document. By 1800, they were in the Royal Collection, but how they were acquired is unknown. Perhaps they were purchased by one of George III’s agents, who were buying drawings in Italy for the young king around 1760. But it is astonishing that such famous drawings were not mentioned in any inventory, letter or other account for two centuries.
Whatever their history, the presentation drawings were well looked after, as they are in almost pristine condition. We can therefore appreciate Michelangelo’s skill and profound intent as readily as when they were drawn, almost 500 years ago.
