Did Michelangelo Include a Brain Stem in the Sistine Chapel?

The New York Times reports on one of the reasons that Tamargo thinks that the resemblance was intentional:

To Dr. Tamargo’s eye, God’s neck in the fresco is distinctly different from those of other figures depicted in more or less the same posture. Usually, the neck looks smooth, but in “The Separation of Light From Darkness” there are lines and shapes quite different from the normal external anatomy of the neck, irregularities that he believes cannot be accidental. “The anatomy of the neck is very, very unusual,” he said, and if it were not intentionally drawn that way, “you would have to postulate that Michelangelo had a very bad day, which is very unlikely because he was very meticulous.”

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Digital “shadow analysis.” A, close-up of God's neck (gray scale, increased contrast) is compared with a photograph of a plastic brain model (SOMSO-plast Brain model BS20, 2001) in similar oblique, ventral views. Inset shows original color photo for context. B, shadow areas are transcribed in red using a digital paintbrush in Adobe Photoshop (CS2, 2005). Image credit: Neurosurgery: doi: 10.1227/01.NEU.0000368101.34523.E1

...Joanna Woods-Marsden, a professor of art history at the University of California, Los Angeles, was outraged as much by the authors’ hypothesis as by their audacity in presenting it. “My initial reaction on looking at the illustrations is that this is complete nonsense, to put it politely,” she wrote in an e-mail message. “To draw arbitrary lines all over Renaissance paintings and expect to be taken seriously by the scholarly community!”

We have few of Michelangelo's anatomical drawings today. Perhaps it isn't very surprising that scientists, professors and physicians want to find anatomical diagrams in his art. It provides evidence that Michelangelo truly was a well-rounded Renaissance man, interested in science as well as being an artistic luminary.

More information: Concealed Neuroanatomy in Michelangelo's Separation of Light From Darkness in the Sistine Chapel, Neurosurgery: May 2010 - Volume 66 - Issue 5 - p 851-861. doi: 10.1227/01.NEU.0000368101.34523.E1

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