Michelangelo Buonarroti (1475–1564) created art that reflected his faith in the beauty and divinity of the human form. “The true work of art is but a shadow of the divine perfection,” he said, revealing his devotion to bringing spirit into stone and color.

A genius of painting, sculpture, and architecture, his luminous fresco The Creation of Adam crowns the ceiling of the Vatican’s Sistine Chapel (1508–1512), a pure expression of human aspiration and divine touch.

In that sacred moment, God reaches across heaven to transmit the spark of life from His fingertip to Adam’s hand. The narrow space between their outstretched fingers holds “the greatest suspension of time and narrative in the history of art,” wrote biographer William E. Wallace, a gesture now among “the most universally recognized and imitated images of all time.”

To paint these vast scenes from Genesis with more than 3,000 figures, Michelangelo labored on his back for four years, inches from the vaulted ceiling, often without seeing his work in full. He painted from east to west, from the chapel’s entrance toward the altar, sustained by faith and endurance.

“Until you have seen the Sistine Chapel,” reflected German philosopher Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, “you have no adequate conception of what man is capable of accomplishing.”

His sculpted Pietà (1498–1499) and the monumental David (1501–1504) capture grace and strength in pure marble. “I saw the angel in the stone and carved until I set him free,” Michelangelo said, trusting the spirit waiting within matter.

His design for the dome of St. Peter’s Basilica (1546–1564) inspired builders for centuries to come. “What the eye can see, the hand will draw,” he said, shaping heaven’s curve into enduring stone.

“I have struggled more than any man ever has, in bad health and with the greatest labor, and still I remain patient in order to reach the desired goal.” His life reminds us that creation, like faith, asks for eternal patience and the courage to keep looking upward.