The Hands of Man

I am always in awe of those who can create something new and creative out of nothing.

It is relatively easy for someone to copy the work of others and add a couple of bells and whistles.

It is the original effort that is difficult. 

Creating something where there is no model or experience.

There is no statement that says it better than what Sir Isaac Newton was known to have said.

"If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants."

In these pages I have written before about some of those who stepped out and have truly done something original that also had transformative effects on society.

Newton would call all of them "giants".

The Wright Brothers.

Steve Jobs.

Elon Musk.

I am a not a big "Arts" guy but I have similar respect for anyone who can create original work in music, film or art. 

That is especially true of sculpture where you start with a block of stone or a mound of clay and turn it into a beautiful form.

I first gained a true appreciation for this when I was in Florence, Italy when I was 18 years old and had the opportunity to see Michelangelo's sculpture of David.

I remember being fixated on the right hand of the statue as I stood several feet away considering the detail and attempting to contemplate how this human shape could have been created from a single block of marble.

 

It was also easy to feel a little small at 18 years of age when I learned that Michelangelo was a mere eight years older than me when he began working on David in 1501 A.D. that then consumed nearly three years of his life. 

It was a giant statue created by a giant of a man.

I recently came across a thread on X.com by @Culture_Crit that highlighted some of the greatest works of lifelike sculptures ever produced.

Here is another marble sculpture by Michelangelo that depicts Moses that was completed in 1515.

Michelangelo did not miss many details in the human form.

Here is a sculpture by Chauncey Bradley Ives (1884) titled "Undine Rising From the Waters".

It does seem as if her garment is wet and clinging to her skin. However, it is all marble.

We also have this statue in marble by Antonio Corradini, "Modesty" (1753) that depicts a veil of sheer fabric over the face and body.

However, could there be a greater example of sculpting a veil out of marble than that created by Giovanni Strazza in the 1850's with "The Veiled Virgin"?

How about this piece by Francesco Queirolo which includes intricate netting?

Incredibly, this work was done with one block of marble and took seven years (1752-1759) to complete.

A closer look at "The Release From Deception" by Queirolo.

A detailed look at the netting.

Credit: https://mymodernmet.com/francesco-queirolo-the-release-from-deception/

I am not sure there is a more realistic marble sculpture than "The Abduction of Prosperina" by Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1622) .The hands gripping Prosperina's body are astounding.

What is most amazing about all of these sculptures is that they were done solely with the hands of man, a creative mind and some rudimentary tools such as a hammer and chisels.

There was no CAD-CAM, artificial intelligence, laser cutting tools or 3D printing.

The hands of man created these masterpieces.

Michelangelo reportedly stated in his later years that he viewed his work not so much sculpture but of liberating figures that were already existing in the stone. He contended he could see  them in his mind's eye and his work was to merely chip away the excess material around the figure.

Is there anyone alive today who could create such masterpieces using only their hands and the tools available in these prior periods of human history?

Seeing all of this reminds me of passage in Walter Isaacson's biography of Elon Musk that seems particularly relevant when considering all of this.

Elon found it surprising---and frightening --- that technological progress was not inevitable. It could stop and even backslide. America had gone to the moon. But then came the grounding of the Shuttle missions and an end to the progress.  

"Do we want to tell our children that going to the moon is the best we did, and then we gave up?, he asks.

Ancient Egyptians learned how to build the pyramids, but then that knowledge was lost. The same happened to Rome, which built aqueducts and other wonders that were lost in the Dark Ages. Was that happening to America?"

"People are mistaken when they think that technology just automatically improves", he would say in a TED talk a few years later.  "It only improves if a lot of people work very hard to make it better."

The truth of Elon's views hits home even more so right now considering the events of the last few days when an American built spacecraft returned to the moon for the first time in 51 years.

Source: https://phys.org/news/2024-02-years-moon.html#google_vignette

What is also true in looking at these great works of art, even when technology improves, it does not necessarily mean that the final product is better or more inspiring than that which was done with the hands of man.

The same can be said of that moon landing last week when you compare the tools at hand today compared to what existed 51 years ago.

Source: https://blog.adobe.com/en/publish/2022/11/08/fast-forward-comparing-1980s-supercomputer-to-modern-smartphone