Commemorative stamp series - Germany / German Democratic Republic 1975 - 25 Pfennig

Important Personalities, Edition 1975 The Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications of the German Democratic Republic publishes five special postage stamps with portraits of important personalities. Michelangelo Buonarroti, actually Michelagniolo di Lodovico by Leonardo di Buonarroto Simoni, was born on 6 March 1475 in Caprese in the Casentino and died on 18 February 1564 in Rome. He lived and worked in his hometown of Florence, which he temporarily had to leave because of his political commitment as a Republican, in Bologna and in Rome. With Leonardo da Vinci and Raffael Michelangelo is one of the most important artists of the High Renaissance, the heyday of early capitalist art development in Italy. It is the final phase of an epoch which Friedrich Engels called "the greatest progressive revolution" that "humanity had experienced until then," a time "which has produced giants of power of thought and passion and character." Michelangelo, whose sculptural talent includes sculptors, painters, master builders and poets, who, by virtue of his temporal scope, at the same time points to the beginning of absolutist relations, to the Baroque era. His work glorifies the creative power of the individual, the passionate belief in the mastery of the universe, but also models the dramatic tensions of his time, torn by contradictions, in a powerful dynamic form. Of the early sculptures, the "Pietà" is famous (1498 to 1505, Rome, St. Peter) and the gigantic "David" (1501 to 1504), which was erected as protector of the city of Florence in Piazza della Signorina. Works of the later period, the powerful figure of the athlete "Moses" (1515/16, Rome, San Pietro in Vincoli), the dying and the captive slave (Paris, Louvre), who were destined for a grandiose tomb of Pope Julius II The greatness and boldness of Michelangelo's artistic intent as well as the dramatically designed unity of architecture and sculpture of the tomb chapel of the Medici (1521-1534, Florence, S. Lorenzo, Sagrestia nuova). Also as a master builder, Michelangelo directed the construction of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome from 1547 to 1564, he is a brilliant planner and designer. Under his leadership, the staircase of the Bibliotheca Laurenziana in Florence, the dome of St. Peter and the Capitol Square in Rome, the first closed course in Europe emerged. At the same time, he is the greatest painter of his time. This is evidenced by the powerful, vivid figures, prophets and sibyls of his powerful visions of the creation story on the ceiling painting of the Sistine Chapel (1508 to 1512, Rome) and perhaps his most exciting work the "Last Judgment", a giant fresco on the altar wall of the Sistine Chapel. It was started as a general show on Dante's Divine Comedy in 1535, finished in 1541, and is of overwhelming power and artistic intensity. Michelangelo's poems, especially his sonnets, some of which are translated by Rainer Maria Rilke, ensure him a permanent place in world literature.