The 1912 caption reads: "Michelangelo at work in Vatican. None but Michelangelo could have conceived and painted the great picture of Last Judgment that stands out instinct with power and majesty on the wall of the Sistine Chapel. It never ceases to astonish men." Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, known simply as Michelangelo (1475-1564), was an Italian sculptor, painter, architect and poet of the High Renaissance born in the Republic of Florence, who exerted an unparalleled influence on the development of Western art.