Creative Commons Coloring Book - Art

Art: Michelangelo's David

  The best artist has that thought alone
     Which is contained within the marble shell;
     The sculptor’s hand can only break the spell
  To free the figures slumbering in the stone.
     -- Michelangelo

The artist

At age 6 Michelangelo was sent to grammar school; he showed no interest, preferring to watch painters at nearby churches, and to draw. At 13, he apprenticed as a painter, then started studying sculpture at 14. He completed his first commissioned sculptures as a teenager. "It was frequently said that Michelangelo could visualise the finished sculpture just by gazing at a block of stone."[*]https://www.michelangelo.org/, retrieved 8/9/22. He was recognized as a great painter and sculptor during his lifetime [*]1475-1564, which overlaps Leonardo DaVinci (1452-1519); it is said they disliked each other and had a tremendous impact on future artists.

The sculpture

Michelangelo's David stands 17 feet tall, weighs more than 12,000 pounds, and was carved from one block of marble. That block was worked on more than 50 years earlier by two other sculptors attempting to carve a statue of David; but working with that stone was very challenging due to its imperfections. Michelangelo took up the challenge, starting at age 26, and working on it for over two years.

"It is said he created a wax model of his design, and submerged it in water. As he worked, he would let the level of the water drop, and using different chisels, sculpted what he could see emerging. He slept sporadically, and when he did he slept with his clothes and even his boots still on, and rarely ate."[*]https://www.michelangelo.org/david.jsp, retrieved 8/9/22

It shows young David, before his battle against Goliath.

The subject

As a boy, David was a shepherd - seen as a low job, looked down on by much of society. When he was between 10 and 16 years old, the prophet Samuel came to his father and brothers, looking to anoint the future king of Israel. This was dangerous since Saul (Israel's first king, who Samuel had earlier anointed) was jealous and would fight any threat to him as king. God told Samuel that none of David's seven older brothers was to be king, so he asked if there were any others. The reply? Just David, out in the fields. Of course, he was the one God had chosen.

When David was between 15 and 18 years old,[*]probably: some sources suggest he was in his 20's his father sent him to bring food to his brothers in Saul's army. Every day, the Philistine giant[*]probably over nine and a half feet tall Goliath insulted God and challenged the armies of Israel to send someone to fight him: if they could defeat him, then the Philistines would serve the Israelites; but if he defeated them, the Israelites would have to serve the Philistines. The soldiers were afraid, but David trusted in the Lord to help - as He had helped him kill a lion and a bear attacking his flocks. So, he took a sling and some smooth stones, challenged Goliath - and won.

Through the rest of his life, he did many things, both great and horrible. He wrote many songs, preserved as Psalms. And so the caretakers of the Cathedral in Florence chose him as a good subject for a great statue.

Every beauty which is seen here by persons of perception resembles more than anything else that celestial source from which we all are come.
- Michelangelo

Cropped, and heavily edited to be a black and white drawing rather than a color photo.

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