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Michaelangelo hated painting the Sistine Chapel, and here's the poem that proves it.
While Michelangelo’s artistic genius is celebrated in one of the most iconic works of art—the Sistine Chapel, his pride was accompanied by a surprising sentiment… a hatred for the very masterpiece that we all know and love today. In a poem, he detailed the ‘torturous’ labour he had to endure, and you can read it below:
Michelangelo: To Giovanni da Pistoia
'When the Author Was Painting the Vault of the Sistine Chapel'
(Translated by Gail Mazur)
I've already grown a goitre from this torture,
hunched up here like a cat in Lombardy
(or anywhere else where the stagnant water's poison).
My stomach's squashed under my chin, my beard's
pointing at heaven, my brain's crushed in a casket,
my breast twists like a harpy's. My brush,
above me all the time, dribbles paint
so my face makes a fine floor for droppings!
My haunches are grinding into my guts,
my poor ass strains to work as a counterweight,
every gesture I make is blind and aimless.
My skin hangs loose below me, my spine's
all knotted from folding over itself.
I'm bent taut as a Syrian bow.
Because I'm stuck like this, my thoughts
are crazy, perfidious tripe:
anyone shoots badly through a crooked blowpipe.
My painting is dead.
Defend it for me, Giovanni, protect my honour.
I am not in the right place—I am not a painter.
'When the Author Was Painting the Vault of the Sistine Chapel'
(Translated by Gail Mazur)
I've already grown a goitre from this torture,
hunched up here like a cat in Lombardy
(or anywhere else where the stagnant water's poison).
My stomach's squashed under my chin, my beard's
pointing at heaven, my brain's crushed in a casket,
my breast twists like a harpy's. My brush,
above me all the time, dribbles paint
so my face makes a fine floor for droppings!
My haunches are grinding into my guts,
my poor ass strains to work as a counterweight,
every gesture I make is blind and aimless.
My skin hangs loose below me, my spine's
all knotted from folding over itself.
I'm bent taut as a Syrian bow.
Because I'm stuck like this, my thoughts
are crazy, perfidious tripe:
anyone shoots badly through a crooked blowpipe.
My painting is dead.
Defend it for me, Giovanni, protect my honour.
I am not in the right place—I am not a painter.
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