Buonamico Buffalmacco I – The Last Judgment and The Inferno
The Last Judgment has been a subject in Western art since the fourth century, reaching its complete form in the twelfth century, when it was placed on the outer facade of cathedrals or on the inner facade of churches, marking the end of the life of Christians and their ultimate encounter with Christ. The work most cited by fourteenth-century painters was Giotto's fresco in the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua (1303-6), but the subject was taken up by Fra Angelico and Michelangelo and remained common until the eighteenth century.
The theme of the Last Judgment, with the reward or condemnation of people by God, depending on their deeds, is found in the Old Testament in the stories of the prophets, and in particular of Daniel, who uses shocking images taken up in the imagery to describe the time of Judgment with the “Son of Man who comes in the clouds” (7: 12). Western iconography, however, is based on the account given in the Gospel of Matthew (25: 31 - 46; 16: 27) with the sudden return of Christ.
There is a clear invitation to “keep watch” (Matthew 24: 42). “When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sir upon the throne of his glory” and He will judge “all nations” on the basis of their love of others. After which “these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal”. First, to the sound of the trumpet, as Saint Paul explains in some Letters (1 Thess 4: 16-17; 1 Cor 15: 52) the dead shall rise again, but changed, and “incorruptible”.
The vast Parousia is therefore the triumph of the dead Christ resurrected for his love of humanity. The redeeming value of his Passion is expressed by the angels above, and by the instruments of his martyrdom: the scourges, the crown of thorns, the nails, Veronica's veil, the reed with the sponge soaked in vinegar, the spear, and the shroud. They are now sources of light, like the wound hi the side of Christ enthroned who, in the iridescent “mandorla” a symbol of his regal transcendence raises his arm in condemnation, opening his seamless tunic in a very human manner, revealing the luminous wound. This is a strict, but also a mild Christ. The twelve apostles are seated on thrones around him, each with a living expression that conveys their individual spiritual personality. Next to Christ, in the iridescent “mandorla”, a symbol of her virginity, sits Mary, the Queen and Heaven's Gate, in a blue sky, the colour of majesty. On the same level as the Son, the Virgin is shown as “Theotokos”, the Mother of God, suggesting tenderness and mercy towards humanity. The group with Christ and Mary with the Apostles is therefore the spiritual and emotional center of this painting.
The story of humanity undergoing the Last Judgment unfolds in large, lively parallel scenes beneath this group. The “resurrection of the flesh” is shown below the central group of trumpeting angels, dominated by a warrior angel with two large cartouches. It is a scene of pure terror: an angel crouches down on the “Dies Irae”, or “day of wrath”, according to the Sequence that all the faithful would know. A statuesque Archangel Michael stands with his sword drawn, as one who has fought against the devil (Rev. 12:7). Another angel addresses him, bringing him one of the saved and he points him towards the group of the blessed. They live in mutual evangelical love: a queen helps another crowned woman to emerge from the tomb. The blessed are divided into overlapping groups in hierarchical order, pleading and adoring and facing the Judge. Below the patriarchs, with Adam and Eve now in old age, are the Baptist and the saints (Dominic, Francis with his stigmata, and Benedict), and then the “choir” of popes, bishops, prelates, and kings. Lower down, the company of merchants and knights and, lastly, the world of women. A vista of people praying in Paradise, where Christ the Lamb “is the shepherd” (Apocalypse 7: 17).
On opposite left side there is the Inferno. Closely linked to the Last Judgment by means of the “wide gate”, located in lower right side of the hell mountain, it sums up the medieval idea of condemnation to eternal fire “prepared for the devil and his angels” (Matthew 25: 41) with horrible torture, which decorated churches and chapels. Echoes of Dante's Inferno can be felt everywhere. Lucifer, a three-headed giant, devours sinners and then excretes them (Inferno, XXXIV, V. 28) in a subterranean world filled with fire and pain. All around him, ape-like demons torment the souls placed in circles: he greedy, the gluttonous, the violent, the lustful. Like the cells of an immense beehive, they emanate from the monstrous central figure which was “cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him” by God (Apocalypse 12: 9).
The scenes exhibit the furious dynamism of the dammed being banished. Three angels force these miserable beings towards “wide gate” of the hell, in an atmosphere of terror, among “sighs, complaints, and deep groans” (Dante, Inferno, III, v. 22) but also of “mutual hate”. There is a dramatic scene in which young women hurl themselves on others, as they emerge in frenzy from the gates of hell, to drag them inside. Hell is indeed a rigid place where the devils enjoy tormenting the damned, who are painted with acute realism, terrified and screaming. The entrance is through the immense mouth of a serpent, the animal that symbolises the Devil (Genesis 3: 14-15). The atmosphere is one of a terrifying horror story made up to convince the faithful to shun Evil. Among the dammed, there are powerful kings and dignitaries, unworthy people of the Church, and “heretics” as the Muslims were considered, and Jews, who did not recognize Christ as the Messiah. Real men and women, now desperate, grimacing in pain and plunging down towards hell, where sin continues to exist, as in the vain woman looking at herself in a mirror. The message is eloquent because, unlike the sky and the earth, the words of Christ “will never pass away” (Matthew 24: 35).
Source: Museum Notice
Buffalmacco’s mural painting
Last Judgment m. 6,0 x m. 8,6; Inferno m. 6,0 x m. 7,0
1326 – 1341
Pisa, Piazza dei Miracoli, Camoposanto Munumantale
Buonamico Buffalmacco I – The Last Judgment and The Inferno
The Last Judgment has been a subject in Western art since the fourth century, reaching its complete form in the twelfth century, when it was placed on the outer facade of cathedrals or on the inner facade of churches, marking the end of the life of Christians and their ultimate encounter with Christ. The work most cited by fourteenth-century painters was Giotto's fresco in the Scrovegni Chapel in Padua (1303-6), but the subject was taken up by Fra Angelico and Michelangelo and remained common until the eighteenth century.
The theme of the Last Judgment, with the reward or condemnation of people by God, depending on their deeds, is found in the Old Testament in the stories of the prophets, and in particular of Daniel, who uses shocking images taken up in the imagery to describe the time of Judgment with the “Son of Man who comes in the clouds” (7: 12). Western iconography, however, is based on the account given in the Gospel of Matthew (25: 31 - 46; 16: 27) with the sudden return of Christ.
There is a clear invitation to “keep watch” (Matthew 24: 42). “When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sir upon the throne of his glory” and He will judge “all nations” on the basis of their love of others. After which “these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal”. First, to the sound of the trumpet, as Saint Paul explains in some Letters (1 Thess 4: 16-17; 1 Cor 15: 52) the dead shall rise again, but changed, and “incorruptible”.
The vast Parousia is therefore the triumph of the dead Christ resurrected for his love of humanity. The redeeming value of his Passion is expressed by the angels above, and by the instruments of his martyrdom: the scourges, the crown of thorns, the nails, Veronica's veil, the reed with the sponge soaked in vinegar, the spear, and the shroud. They are now sources of light, like the wound hi the side of Christ enthroned who, in the iridescent “mandorla” a symbol of his regal transcendence raises his arm in condemnation, opening his seamless tunic in a very human manner, revealing the luminous wound. This is a strict, but also a mild Christ. The twelve apostles are seated on thrones around him, each with a living expression that conveys their individual spiritual personality. Next to Christ, in the iridescent “mandorla”, a symbol of her virginity, sits Mary, the Queen and Heaven's Gate, in a blue sky, the colour of majesty. On the same level as the Son, the Virgin is shown as “Theotokos”, the Mother of God, suggesting tenderness and mercy towards humanity. The group with Christ and Mary with the Apostles is therefore the spiritual and emotional center of this painting.
The story of humanity undergoing the Last Judgment unfolds in large, lively parallel scenes beneath this group. The “resurrection of the flesh” is shown below the central group of trumpeting angels, dominated by a warrior angel with two large cartouches. It is a scene of pure terror: an angel crouches down on the “Dies Irae”, or “day of wrath”, according to the Sequence that all the faithful would know. A statuesque Archangel Michael stands with his sword drawn, as one who has fought against the devil (Rev. 12:7). Another angel addresses him, bringing him one of the saved and he points him towards the group of the blessed. They live in mutual evangelical love: a queen helps another crowned woman to emerge from the tomb. The blessed are divided into overlapping groups in hierarchical order, pleading and adoring and facing the Judge. Below the patriarchs, with Adam and Eve now in old age, are the Baptist and the saints (Dominic, Francis with his stigmata, and Benedict), and then the “choir” of popes, bishops, prelates, and kings. Lower down, the company of merchants and knights and, lastly, the world of women. A vista of people praying in Paradise, where Christ the Lamb “is the shepherd” (Apocalypse 7: 17).
On opposite left side there is the Inferno. Closely linked to the Last Judgment by means of the “wide gate”, located in lower right side of the hell mountain, it sums up the medieval idea of condemnation to eternal fire “prepared for the devil and his angels” (Matthew 25: 41) with horrible torture, which decorated churches and chapels. Echoes of Dante's Inferno can be felt everywhere. Lucifer, a three-headed giant, devours sinners and then excretes them (Inferno, XXXIV, V. 28) in a subterranean world filled with fire and pain. All around him, ape-like demons torment the souls placed in circles: he greedy, the gluttonous, the violent, the lustful. Like the cells of an immense beehive, they emanate from the monstrous central figure which was “cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him” by God (Apocalypse 12: 9).
The scenes exhibit the furious dynamism of the dammed being banished. Three angels force these miserable beings towards “wide gate” of the hell, in an atmosphere of terror, among “sighs, complaints, and deep groans” (Dante, Inferno, III, v. 22) but also of “mutual hate”. There is a dramatic scene in which young women hurl themselves on others, as they emerge in frenzy from the gates of hell, to drag them inside. Hell is indeed a rigid place where the devils enjoy tormenting the damned, who are painted with acute realism, terrified and screaming. The entrance is through the immense mouth of a serpent, the animal that symbolises the Devil (Genesis 3: 14-15). The atmosphere is one of a terrifying horror story made up to convince the faithful to shun Evil. Among the dammed, there are powerful kings and dignitaries, unworthy people of the Church, and “heretics” as the Muslims were considered, and Jews, who did not recognize Christ as the Messiah. Real men and women, now desperate, grimacing in pain and plunging down towards hell, where sin continues to exist, as in the vain woman looking at herself in a mirror. The message is eloquent because, unlike the sky and the earth, the words of Christ “will never pass away” (Matthew 24: 35).
Source: Museum Notice
Buffalmacco’s mural painting
Last Judgment m. 6,0 x m. 8,6; Inferno m. 6,0 x m. 7,0
1326 – 1341
Pisa, Piazza dei Miracoli, Camoposanto Munumantale