The Last Judgment

This is the most suffocating and awe-inspiring wall in Vatican City, a super apocalyptic carnival that displays heaven and hell simultaneously. This colossal 14-meter-high fresco, The Last Judgment, dominates the entire wall behind the altar of the Sistine Chapel. Imagine this: twenty-five years after painting the ceiling, an aging Michelangelo was summoned back to this very room by the Pope. This time, he didn’t bring the hope of ascending to the clouds; instead, he unleashed a flesh-and-blood storm intertwined with over 300 figures, essentially pressing the souls of all pilgrims firmly into the ground.

The center of the composition features a beardless, bulging-muscled Jesus resembling a Lord of Thunder. He raises his right arm as if intending to strike sinners into the bottomless abyss in a split second. The upper part of the fresco shows ecstatic saints and salvation, while the lower part depicts desperate falls and the frantic grabbing by demons of hell. Put on your “Microscope” and look closely at the hellish scene in the bottom right corner: there is Minos, the judge of the underworld, depicted with donkey ears and a giant venomous snake wrapped tightly around his waist (with the snake biting his most private parts). This isn’t just a mythological metaphor; this is real-life revenge! The Pope’s Master of Ceremonies at the time, Biagio da Cesena, absolutely despised the countless naked bodies flying around the painting and even complained to the Pope that it looked “like a communal bathhouse.” A vengeful Michelangelo didn’t say a word; he simply painted Biagio’s face onto the demon judge, condemning him to eternal damnation.

f you are completely unfamiliar with Christianity, you might wonder what these countless flying people are actually doing. Simply put, “The Last Judgment” is the ultimate human finale set in the Bible: when the apocalypse arrives, everyone (no matter how long they’ve been dead) will resurrect from their graves to line up for the ultimate job interview with the big boss, Jesus. Those who pass the interview (the salvaged) get to float up the clouds on the left to vacation in heaven, while the unqualified sinners are heartlessly kicked down the right side to suffer in hell. To make this finale even more terrifying, Michelangelo did a crossover, borrowing characters from Greek mythology—the demon in the lower left wildly striking people with an oar is Charon, the ferryman who transports the dead across the River Styx in Greek myth. Mixing pagan mythology with orthodox religion like this is equivalent to a DC universe villain suddenly popping up in a Marvel finale, which was considered an exceptionally bold and rebellious move at the time.

The birth of this painting is set against one of the most tragic periods in European history. A few years before this fresco was painted, the troops of the Holy Roman Empire sacked Rome (the Sack of Rome in 1527), turning the entire city into a living hell. The optimistic confidence in human reason and beauty from the High Renaissance was utterly shattered by brutal slaughter. Michelangelo poured this trauma of the era, the fear brought by the Reformation, and his deep despair over human destiny entirely onto this wall. Gone are the perfect proportions and serene beauty; left behind are only twisted limbs and the endless terror of the apocalypse.

Even funnier gossip emerged after the painting was completed: because the gods and saints not only had overly developed muscles but were also completely stark naked (including Jesus), conservative hardliners considered it blasphemous and outrageous. So, shortly after Michelangelo’s death, the Pope hurriedly hired his pupil Daniele da Volterra to “censor” the work—painting loincloths and underpants over all the sensitive bits. Consequently, this poor pupil earned one of the most comical nicknames in art history: “Il Braghettone” (The Breeches Maker). Although recent modern restorations have cleaned off some of the added underwear, several “loincloths” were permanently kept on the Sistine wall to preserve the historical trace, leaving future generations with a sly chuckle.