Preparatory drawings show her standing and facing Christ with arms outstretched, in a more traditional intercessory posture. It appears that the moment has passed for her to exercise her traditional role of pleading on behalf of the dead with John the Baptist this Deesis is a regular motif in earlier compositions. To the left of Christ is his mother, Virgin Mary, who turns her head to look down towards the Saved, though her pose also suggests resignation. However, there are parallels for his pose in earlier Last Judgments, especially one in the Camposanto of Pisa, which Michelangelo would have known here the raised hand is part of a gesture of ostentatio vulnerum ('display of the wounds'), where the resurrected Christ reveals the wounds of his Crucifixion, which can be seen on Michelangelo's figure. He is beardless, and 'compounded from antique conceptions of Hercules, Apollo, and Jupiter Fulminator', probably, in particular, the Belvedere Apollo, brought to the Vatican by Pope Julius II.

Īt the centre of the work is Christ, shown as the individual verdicts of the Last Judgment are pronounced he looks down towards the damned. There is an impression that all the groups of figures are circling the central figure of Christ in a huge rotary movement. Freedberg interprets their 'complex responses' as 'those of giant powers here made powerless, bound by racking spiritual anxiety', as their role of intercessors with the deity had come to an end, and perhaps they regret some of the verdicts. Where traditional compositions generally contrast an ordered, harmonious heavenly world above with the tumultuous events taking place in the earthly zone below, in Michelangelo's conception the arrangement and posing of the figures across the entire painting give an impression of agitation and excitement, and even in the upper parts there is 'a profound disturbance, tension and commotion' in the figures. Both the amount of nudity and the muscular style of the bodies has been one area of contention, and the overall composition another. The reception of the painting was mixed from the start, with much praise but also criticism on both religious and artistic grounds. Orange, green, yellow, and blue are scattered throughout, animating and unifying the complex scene. The cleaning and restoration of the fresco, however, revealed a greater chromatic range than previously apparent. The fresco is more monochromatic than the ceiling frescoes and is dominated by the tones of flesh and sky.

In the upper part, the inhabitants of Heaven are joined by the newly saved. In the lower part of the fresco, Michelangelo followed tradition in showing the saved ascending at the left and the damned descending at the right.

He had originally accepted the commission from Pope Clement VII, but it was completed under Pope Paul III whose stronger reforming views probably affected the final treatment. Michelangelo began working on it 25 years after having finished the Sistine Chapel ceiling, and was nearly 67 at its completion. The work took over four years to complete between 15 (preparation of the altar wall began in 1535). Altogether there are over 300 figures, with nearly all the males and angels originally shown as nudes many were later partly covered up by painted draperies, of which some remain after recent cleaning and restoration. The dead rise and descend to their fates, as judged by Christ who is surrounded by prominent saints. It is a depiction of the Second Coming of Christ and the final and eternal judgment by God of all humanity. The Last Judgment ( Italian: Il Giudizio Universale) is a fresco by the Italian Renaissance painter Michelangelo covering the whole altar wall of the Sistine Chapel in Vatican City.

The last judgment michelangelo