How do you get exposure on Deviant Art?

Haven't there been some art historians who have claimed that Michelangelo's DAVID was NOT the Biblical David?

• I assume that the argument was based upon more than circumcision issues (since one can cite a lot of examples of uncircumcised Jews in the art of the Middle Ages, such as the baby Jesus even when older than 8 days.) I vaguely remember all of this being part of the explanation for the over-sized hands of DAVID, that this was the idealized man of the Renaissance or whatever whose power to build and learn was seen as the dawning of a grand new age of human accomplishment and that people have simply ASSUMED that it was the David of the Bible (or even that the sculptor purposely played on this ambiguity to get the Church to pay for what to him was a purely secular project.) But again, I don't know if there was ever a credible story behind all of this. I only remember exposure to this concept while I was in grad school in the 1960's and 1970's. So perhaps there is an art history major out there who can help with this one.

• Answer:

  This has been on your mind for around 50 YEARS ?? Well, of course there are some who would interpret the sculpture as a non-Biblical David. I personally think those people are an older version of modern conspiracy theorists, trying to make people interpret the sculpture as THEY interpret it. (There's some guy in Egypt who is SO egotistical and unreadable really - his view IS the the ONLY view as far as he's concerned, but that's off-topic). I think it IS Michelangelo's version of the Biblical David, albeit done in the then-emerging Renaissance style. I don't think that Michelangelo was 'playing' the church. --------- In a similar vein, have you heard of the various interpretations of Johannes Vermeer's "Girl With a Pearl Earring' ?? Some of those are just ludicrous - merely an egoistic attempt on the authors' part to draw attention to themselves.