JF Ptak Science Books  Quick Post

I suspect that the subject of “straightening out” of any work of Michelangelo is, well, infrequently done, mainly because of all the things that could and should be written about that man this would be the least of them all.  That said, the “straightening” bit struck me when I was looking at the detail in an engraving of a doorway that Michelangelo design on Capitoline Hill, and the extraordinary detail in the shadowing just called out to me.  The design is beautiful, but all I could think of was how many squares were in that shadow. And then of course one had to wonder how long a line all of those shadow line would be if they were all placed end-to-end. The answer to that is about 300′.  

There you have it. 

The engraving is from C.A. d’Aviler, Cours d’Architecture qui Comprend les Ordres de Vignole…new edition, printed in Paris in 1756, p 325, plate 84, “Porte sous le portique du Capitole”. 

The detail of the shadow:

And the full image: