Angels We Have Seen on High

“I stick my neck out for nobody,” Humphrey Bogart is prone to snarl in Casablanca, and that’s a position I’m growing to understand. When my poor neck is not whipped back and forth by breaking news, it’s squished downward, a moth-rolypoly chimera drawn to my smartphone’s glow. I want to believe this chronic neck pain is one of humanity’s contemporary self-afflictions, but then I remember the Sistine Chapel. “Good Lord!” I say to the bearded Heavenly Father nearly fifty feet above me. “Thank you for coming all this way, but could you—creak—come just a little bit closer?”

Consider prayers answered. From April 1–30, 2020, the Raising Cane’s River Center will offer a floor-level experience with Michelangelo’s astounding creations as it hosts the exhibition Michelangelo—A DIFFERENT VIEW. 

Photo-mechanically reproduced copies, nearly to scale, come to Baton Rouge under the license of the Vatican Museums. Works by Sandro Botticelli, Pietro Perugino, Domenico Ghirlandaio and Cosimo Rosselli are also included to provide the viewer with the same sights that inspired Michelangelo before he ascended the scaffolding, brush in hand. With just a two-meter gap and a posture Emily Post would envy, you can commune all day with God, Adam, and the rest. Thoughtfully, no time limit is imposed on visits, so with the ceiling truly gone, stand close and consider. Rise up, up, up, and what do you find?

$17.50 (adult), $12.50 (groups of 10 or more), and $7.50 (kids 12 and under). Tickets go on pre-sale Friday, August 23,  at 10 am and on sale Monday, September 2, at 10 am at the Raising Cane’s River Center Box Office and Ticketmaster.com.