Methodological Issues in the Psychoanalytic Study of an Artist

Facing you is Michelangelo Buonarroti as he was portrayed in bronze shortly after his death by his loyal friend and follower, Daniele da Volterra (Fig. 1). The bust serves well as a model for the modern biographer. Daniele has recorded a physical being with uncompromising exactitude—the mole on the wrinkled forehead, the bulging, tortuous vein crossing the temple, the flattened, once badly broken nose, the sunken cheeks, forked beard, pursed lips, and lined, leathery face. But we have also been left an intimate statement about a particular man which penetrates beyond the facts of his appearance. We are informed of Michelangelo's privateness, of the strength of his inward concern, of his sadness, his wisdom, and his resolute control over whatever conflict or pain might lie within. Thus we apprehend not only what the eyes can perceive but what is concealed. It is Daniele's achievement in expressing the humanity