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THE HAGUE, Oct 5 (AFP) - Some 90 drawings by Renaissance master Michelangelo Buonarroti, including studies for the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome, have been reunited for the first time in 500 years at the Dutch Teylers museum in Haarlem, close to Amsterdam.
The exhibition, simply called Michelangelo, is the result of a rare collaboration of the Teylers museum with the British Museum in London and the Ashmolean in Oxford, central England. The drawings will be on show in Haarlem until January 8 and then at the British Museum from March 23 to June 25.
The unique collection of original drawings features a large number of sketches of muscular male nudes, a leitmotif in his work. It also includes several studies for the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel including the famous hand of God touching Adam's and the fresco of the Last Judgement created for the chapel.
The Teylers, housed in the private lodgings of a rich 18th century silk merchant, also has the designs Michelangelo (1475-1564) made for the construction of the dome of St Peters in Rome, the tomb of Pope Julius II and the tomb of the Medici family in Florence.
The Teylers' 25 sketches were part of a collection established in the 17th century by Queen Christine of Sweden and bought in 1790 by a benefactor of the museum.
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