Sistine Chapel Ceiling

Four years, largely alone, mostly standing on scaffolding with paint dripping into his eyes. Michelangelo — who insisted he was a sculptor, not a painter — reshaped what fresco could do. Nine scenes from Genesis run down the spine, framed by prophets, sibyls, and the ignudi (nude youths) whose anatomy is a study in itself. The chronology runs backwards toward the altar: you enter through the end of Noah's story and walk toward the Creation. Bring binoculars, and look for the Prophet Jonah above the altar — impossibly foreshortened, twisting up out of the wall as if physically escaping the ceiling.