Michelangelo’s Snowman
It’s February 2026 and still winter. Snow is forecast but only on the moors and hills. I remember some heavy snows of the past when you could go outside and sculpt things from the snow. Usually a snowman. When I was very young, snow was something magic to me but later, my mother told me of a hard year when I was baby of 4-5months and the snow level came halfway up the door. It was a bad time to care for a very young child when, for instance, nappies had to be washed and dried with only a single coal fire for warmth to hang them round, and the fear that the coal might run out during the bitter weather.
So the beauty of snow is never far away from the worst of it. In 1494 Florence, Italy, there was a rare heavy snowfall. In 1568 a book written by Giorgio Vasari, recalled it in an unusual way. His book is a valuable source of information about great renaissance artists, even today.
Vasari was an artist and writer who’d been a student and friend of Michelangelo. In his book, he wrote about Michelangelo, who’d died two years before. Vasari was complementary about his friend and wrote how he was a favourite of the great Medici family; as a boy and young man he was close to them and highly regarded for his artistic skill. As well as appreciating the young man’s ability, it seems that Piero de Medici would often send for Michelangelo for advice on antiques.
In his book, Vasari wrote a single sentence about snow and Michelangelo, who had been aged19 or 20yrs old at the time.
…and one winter, when snow fell in Florence, he [i.e. Piero de Medici] had him make in his courtyard a statue of snow, which was very beautiful.
That’s all it says. I find it intriguing, yet I believe it. I know of Michelangelo. I have seen existing proof of his ability to create beauty in Florence and elsewhere. I know snow. But I will never know what transient beauty he created out of the snow?
It’s interesting to reflect on this. In a world where certainty is much desired, is transience still valuable? There are so many things that we class as beautiful but does fleeting beauty still have a meaning when it has gone from us? Does it still have a worth, or value? Is it even more precious because it only lasted a short time and was known only to a few? I don’t know.
I am reminded of a biblical phrase – Jesus said to him, ‘Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.’