Describing Art – Sistine Chapel Ceiling

Michelangelo decorated the dome of the Sistine Chapel with exceptional artistic skill. Lines are used by the artist to match actual architecture to fictional architecture. To do this, he painted decorative moldings that seem to rhyme with the building's architecture in order to produce imaginary seating stones for some of the painted persons that seem to be seated all over the roof. Michelangelo effectively employs a map to display a number of instances that can be described as biblical occurrences. By using the grid, the artwork creates a form of a story with various chapters in it, each separated by a grid line. To achieve elegance and adequate rhyme with the curved edges of the roof, the artist introduces triangular-like curved shapes, also with a painting in them. These shapes achieve a flow from the flat ceiling top to its edge and attach smoothly to the walls of the chapel. He takes advantage of the window of the chapel to sort of extend their top edge into the triangular-shaped tops that create additional room for integrating additional stories. The colors red and brown are prominent on the ceiling painting. This color code creates a biblical feel that was common in religious books of the 16th and 15th centuries, as well as traditional religious paintings. It also rhymes with Roman Catholic religious color scheme. Michelangelo adds different colors to match the various elements represented in the paintings, including blue for water bodies and green for vegetation. Works cited Sistine Chapel. N.p., n.d. Web. 21 July 2017.