Pieta
Encyclopedia : P : PI : PIE : Pieta
- This article is about a form of art. There is also a town called Pietà, Malta
-->A pietà (pl. same; Italian for compassion) is an artwork depicting the Virgin Mary cradling the dead body of Christ. As such, it is a particular form of the devotional theme of Our Lady of Sorrows.
One of the most famous pietàs is Michelangelo's Pietà in the Vatican. This is considered by some to be one of Michelangelo's greatest works of art, completed when he was 24 years old in 1499 AD. Interestingly, it is the only work signed by Michelangelo (on a diagonal ribbon carved across Mary's breast) possibly indicating his satisfaction with his work. Another account states the artist chiseled his name out of rage for a false attribution to one of his contemporaries. When it was unveiled in 1500, Michelangelo overheard a crowd admiring it. Going closer, he soon discovered that another artist was stealing his glory. The people could not believe that a previously unknown young artist had produced something of such staggering beauty. That night, out of a caustic combination of injured pride and jealousy he chiseled a message to all future viewers on the sash across Mary's chest: MICHAELA[N]GELUS BONAROTUS FLORENTIN[US] FACIEBAT (Michelangelo Buonarroti, Florentine, made this). However, he later regretted this action. A rare leather pietà is in the church St. Peter und Paul in Eschweiler, Germany.
In 1972 the statue was vandalised by Lazlo Toth wielding a hammer; he was later declared insane.
Sculptor Luis Jiménez, reversing the gender of the figures involved, used the popular Mexican and Chicano image and myth of the Aztec warrior holding his dead lover to create the monumental ''Southwest Pieta", located in Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA.
The American Pietà was the name given to a famous Reuters photograph of the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, depicting a policeman and four firemen carrying the body of fire department chaplain Mychal F. Judge out of the World Trade Center rubble.
External links
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.