Of the prophets depicted in the Sistine Chapel by Michelangelo, the arrangement of Ezekiel’s legs and the drapery wrapped around his body appear to describe a medical illustration of a medieval cataract surgery called “couching.” San Diego Artist Bethany Britz identified the revelation on Friday, July 26, 2024. “I was concentrating on the prophets from Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel for other reasons, when it became obvious to me that the drapery wrapped tightly around Ezekiel’s left shoulder could be interpreted as illustrating a lens getting removed from an eye.” Since 1990, other discoveries of anatomical or medical illustrations have been found within the Sistine Chapel figures, showing precedent within Michalangelo’s work.
What makes the illustration so especially appropriate to Ezekiel were his visions as a prophet. Seeing beyond this world already provokes the concepts of “vision,” but he moreover envisioned a whole machine like an armillary sphere, of four or six wheels working together to move smoothly, without turning; and the machine was covered in eyes.
“Cataract” comes from a Greek word for “waterfall,” which was coined for the condition because it was believed to be caused by excess “humor” or extra water in the eye, and it was believed that releasing the water would restore sight. Michelanelo’s fresco figure for Ezekiel has two knees, one draped by cloth that flows like a waterfall to the floor, and the other that is undraped. “I think the knees represent two eyes, the right one being the one with the cataract condition. The flowing drapery represents this ‘waterfall’ idea, with the hand on that side posed supine; the hand near the undraped knee holds a scroll, as if capable of reading,” said Britz. “Then the left shoulder, wrapped tightly with the drapery: this is the detail of the cataract procedure. The twisted fabric is the optic nerve, the shape of the cloth wrapped around his body makes an ‘eye’ shape, with a flap of fabric flowing over the eye. A tight little cap on his head in the same color as the ‘eye’ could represent the lens of the eye getting poked out or pushed back into the eye to cure the cataract condition.
“Also,” Britz continued, “as drawing, painting and art supplies became more sophisticated, so did representation – including medical illustration. An oblique view of the eye is a break from the entirely unhelpful, practically symbolic medical illustrations of eyes from the Medieval period; the oblique perspective is far more informative and implies that Michelangelo actually witnessed or studied a dissection of an eye. As a medical illustration, there is enough there to understand the lens as being a structure inside of the eye and that it can be removed. The draped fabric recalling a waterfall is poetic support for the concept; and of course, Ezekiel as the eye guy might cinch the interpretation for a lot of people.”
Bethany Britz is an artist living and working in California since 1998, with her images and ideas available at www.bethanybritz.com.