VIRTUAL MICHELANGELO. Digital survey of the plaster works of the Fine Arts Academy “Pietro Vannucci” of Perugia

Abstract

The Michelangelo plaster works of the Fine Arts Academy of Perugia represent an unsolved enigma of art history. Formally they echo the sculptures Day, Night, Dawn and Dusk, molded by the Italian Renaissance genius for the Medici tombs of the Sagrestia Nuova of the Basilica of San Lorenzo in Florence, but, at the same time, they don’t follow exactly the lineament of the Florence sculptures, and they express an original poetic due to the autonomous dimensional and expressive characteristics. In the past centuries and up to the contemporary, the scholars have proposed interpretative hypotheses on the origin and historical events of the plaster works, so as to making the famous architect and historian Ugo Tarchi exclaim: “se fosse possibile trasportare i calchi perugini accanto alle statue della Cappella Medicea!”. The paper aims to investigate the relationship between the Perugia plaster works, donated in 1573 by Vincenzo Danti, and the Florence marble sculptures, carved around 1530 by Michelangelo Buonarroti.