Michelangelo (Michelangelo Buonarroti) (Italian, Florentine, 1475–1564) The Torment of Saint Anthony, ca. 1487–88 Oil and tempera on wood; 18 1/2 x 13 3/4 in. (47 x 34.9 cm) Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth, Texas www.metmuseum.org

The Metropolitan Museum in New York City has a special exhibit running through September 7, 2009 of Michelangelo’s First Painting.  If you are at all able to check it out in person, I would urge you to do so, but for those of us who can’t get there, the Met’s site has a fascinating synopsis of the exhibition.

Michelangelo’s first painting, The Torment of Saint Anthony, which he made around 1487-1488 when he was only 12 or 13 years old, was his copy of an engraving made by Martin Schongauer.  It is not a precise copy, however, as Michelangelo made his own adjustments to the composition and color palette.

In addition to the painting getting a thorough, much-needed cleaning by the Met’s staff, digital infrared reflectography was used to reveal Michelangelo’s preliminary drawing beneath the paint, and thus the process that Michelangelo used to execute his own rendition of Schongauer’s engraving.  All of this cleaning and investigation is carefully documented in the Met’s exhibit, and on its site.  In addition, you can access a podcast or audio file detailing the exhibit via the Met’s site as well.

This exhibit is only one of many interesting and well-documented exhibits described on the Met’s site, which proves to be a great place to explore.

Europeana

Europeana.eu is a prototype virtual library created by the European Commission, with links to over 4 million digital items, including images, texts, videos and sounds, which went live in November of 2008.  It can be viewed in a variety of languages, and is intended to provide inspiration through access to Europe’s cultural and scientific heritage.  Contributors include amazing museums, galleries, archives, libraries and audio-visual collections from all over Europe.

Certain aspects of the site are still very much a work in process, such as the Communities pages, and they are actively soliciting feedback from users as to what final form these features will take.  Already up and running is a My Europeana feature, with which items, searches and tags can be saved.  There is also a timeline navigator function, the ability to browse recent additions to the content, and a look into others’ searches.

As someone who just loves discovering a new resource to explore, and loves anything artistic, finding this site felt like I had just entered Valhalla (The project is run by a team from the national library of the Netherlands).

Europeana Version 1.0, which will include access to over 10 million digital items, is planned to launch in 2010.