David in Brief (documentary film) (original) (raw)

The Chartreuse David: A Florentine Souvenir, Michelangelo's David and the Lens of Kitsch

2019

This MRP has been based upon direct in-situ research and observation in Florence, Italy during the spring of 2018, of the subject artwork, Michelangelo’s David (1501-1504). Observation and research into the production, distribution and sales of kitsch objects related to the chartreuse David souvenir in all forms available in Florence as well as globally online was also undertaken. Research on the historical development of the kitsch movement through an examination of Pompeo Batoni’s works, the Grand Tour and the rise of global tourism and the souvenir industry was conducted through examination of writings and journals on the subject as noted in the bibliography and referenced within the body of the MRP

Michelangelo Buonarroti's David: Historical Review and Proposal for New Identification

This paper offers a synthesis of the evidence presented in the book Adamo: Il segreto che riscrive la storia dell'arte, aiming to demonstrate how an interpretive anachronism led to the misidentification of Michelangelo's marble Giant as David. Through a detailed analysis of historical sources, the paper proposes a new reading of the sculpture, identifying it as Adam at the moment of Eve's creation. Why do we call Michelangelo's Giant "David"? The erroneous identification of the figure represented as David is primarily due to a phrase by Giorgio Vasari, who writes: "Michelagnolo, fatto un modello di cera, finse in quello, per la insegna del Palazzo, un Davit giovane con una frombola in mano."(which can be translated as: "Michelangelo, having made a wax model, depicted in it, for the insignia of the palace, a young David with a sling in his hand").However, this passage, when read without considering other historical documents, has been mistakenly interpreted as referring to the marble sculpture. When contextualized, it becomes clear that Vasari was instead referring to the David de Rohan in bronze.

Michelangelo, the David, and Donatello

In Triumph of the Body: Michelangelo and Sixteenth-Century Italian Draughtsmanship, eds. Zoltán Kárpáti, Eszter Nagy, and Péter Ujvári, exhibition catalogue, Budapest, Museum of Fine Arts 2019

Donatello’s David: The Putti Speak

2002

* As the first approaching life-sized, freestanding, sensuous, bronze nude since Antiquity, Donatello's bronze David is a critical monument of the Italian Renaissance. It is also one of the most enigmatic. David is nude, but not completely unclothed, wearing a feminine-looking hat and knee-high boots. David holds a rock and a sword, while standing suggestively, on the head of Goliath. He stands in a relaxed contrapposto stance. His left hand, held to his hip, holds a stone. His right hand is resting on an oversized sword, which points downward to the helmet of Goliath, between the feet of David. As Zuraw pointed out in a talk at the 2000 Renaissance Society of America Meeting, we see different points in the narrative of the story of David and Goliath: holding the stone, before making the fatal sling shot strike, and standing on the decapitated head of Goliath after the kill. (1) The image of David slaying Goliath was rare in art before Donatello, who created an earlier David in 1408-16. Before Donatello's images, David was usually portrayed as a prophet, psalmist, or ancestor of Christ. (2) The nudity of Donatello's David is certainly not unique, but the nudity of the later David by Michelangelo, as an example, does not seem as strange as the nudity of Donatello's. The nudity is not just a response to Donatello's study of classical art, but also is a literal representation of the