Losing my religion (if I had it to lose)

And on the second day, we paid a visit to the house of god. There were several in Rome, of course, more than I could bear, but you don't question the Vatican. And anyway, I was there for the art and architecture. At the risk of offending (well, more than a risk), I have to say it's a shame that so much beauty is produced in the name of religion, as if we could find nothing better to which to devote it. Nevertheless, beautiful it was. To get to the Sistine Chapel, we walked through hall after seemingly endless hall, which is not to say that I didn't enjoy the gleaming statues and columns, and scenic ceilings that stretched to the heavens. But we didn't want to miss Raphael and Michelangelo before closing (which had happened to a friend we met there), and the authorities really make you work to reach the grand finale.

Anticlimactic does not quite describe Michelangelo's ceiling, as it in no way fell short of majestic. I appreciated, too, that the guards incessantly shushed the crowd and ordered us not to photograph or record (not that that stopped many). It might have been that the "Creation of Adam" section equaled the size of every other section of the ceiling, and seeing the image blown up so often before now dwarfed the real thing. Or perhaps it was that we had just witnessed up close the grandeur of Raphael's frescoes that mutated my expectations.

I'm still humbled that the masterpieces were within my fingertips, but I wonder about the cycle that begets masterpieces. There is no question about the skill behind the ceiling and the School of Athens and the Disputa, but what sets them above other works by Michelangelo and Raphael? The inner cynic argues that we extol the paintings in part because they've been extolled. By the same token, we visit famous sites because they're famous, because recognition adds excitement to the experience. If I were a better traveler (and I've learned this for future ventures) I'd have done more homework, better valued what I saw, and valued it for better reason.

In that case I might have been able to stand more cathedrals, but it was enough in all of St. Peter's Basilica to run into the surprise of Michelangelo's Pieta and similarly to find homages to Galileo in the Basilica of St. Mary of the Angels near Piazza della Repubblica (all of which I highly recommend).

__
Listening to: Goo Goo Dolls
Watching: Slumdog Millionaire
Reading: Sandor Balogh and Sandor Jakab, History of Hungary