A lot of people would say that 89 years is enough time to achieve all you want in life. But what if what you want to achieve is everything? Still, there are some who accomplish this Herculean task in their lifetimes. One such intellectual genius was Michelangelo Buenoratti. In his eighty nine years, he managed to be a world renowned sculptor, painter, architect, poet, writer…no one is fully aware of the full range of his talents. And the dark ages did not restrict his thought. He went ahead and gave birth to his creations in the face of all opposition.

Towards the end of his life, he worked on a number of paintings - all revolving around the crucifixion of Christ. One of the last things he worked on was the carving of the Pietà, which now stands in the Florence Cathedral Museum in all its glory. Legend holds that he intended this to mark his own grave and that it was something he created from within the depths of his heart. The sculpture is such a marvel to look at - with the four figures intertwined in eternity.

Then, there was another Pietà known as the Rondanini Pietà, which is installed in Milan, Castello. This last work of his, which he was working on just a few days prior to his death, is something stark and truly stunning. It is a sculpture depicting the figure of the dead Christ blending with that of his mother. It is very abstract and makes one really think on another plane altogether. The intensity of emotions that Michelangelo has tried to communicate through this work of art rushes forward to stimulate the senses of the viewer and more than accomplishes its objective.

In his entire lifetime, there are many other works of art that the great man is remembered for; one of the most famous of them being the painting of The Last Judgment on the altar wall of the Sistine Chapel.

The sad part of it all is that though his genius was seen and appreciated in his lifetime, there were many who did not give his creations due credit and many of his creations were "altered" to suit their sensibilities.

His final sculpture, the Rondanini Pietà revisited the theme of the Virgin Mary mourning over the body of the dead Christ, which he had first explored in his Pietà of 1499. Like his late series of drawings of the Crucifixion and the sculpture of the Deposition of Christ intended for his own tomb, it was produced at a time when Michelangelo's sense of his own mortality (and with it his spirituality) was growing.

The Rondanini Pietà was begun before the Deposition, although in his dying days Michelangelo hacked at the marble block until only the dismembered right arm of Christ survived from the sculpture as originally conceived. The spectral, waif-like Virgin and Christ are a departure from the idealised figures that exemplified the sculptor's earlier style, and have been said to bear more of a resemblance to the attenuated figures of Gothic sculpture than those of the Renaissance.

When viewing the sculpture from certain rear angles, it looks as if Jesus is holding Mary up with his back, instead of Mary cradling Jesus. It is said that Michelangelo carefully crafted it this way to represent how Jesus's spirit might actually have been comforting Mary in her loss.