Michelangelo’s secret sketches under church in Florence open to public

Artist spent months in a chamber below the Medici Chapels to evade Pope Clement VII’s death sentence

Michelangelo Buonarroti left behind a trail of artistic marvels, including his statue of David and the sublime frescoes that adorn the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

Now a “secret” room in Florence whose walls are sketched with doodles that the Italian Renaissance master is believed to have created while evading a death sentence ordered by Pope Clement VII amid his falling out with the powerful Medici family is to officially open to the public for the first time.