Overview

Raphael was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form, ease of composition, and visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur. Together with Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, he forms the traditional trinity of great masters of that period.

Raphael was enormously productive, running an unusually large workshop and, despite his death at 37, leaving a large body of work. Many of his works are found in the Vatican Palace, where the frescoed Raphael Rooms were the central, and the largest, work of his career. The best known work is The School of Athens in the Vatican Stanza della Segnatura. After his early years in Rome much of his work was executed by his workshop from his drawings, with considerable loss of quality. He was extremely influential in his lifetime, though outside Rome his work was mostly known from his collaborative printmaking.

Career

• Raphael received a commission in 1500 to paint a large altarpiece dedicated to Saint Nicholas of Tolentino, for the Baronci chapel in the Sant'Agostino Church in Città di Castello. The work on the paintings was completed on 13 September, 1501.
  
• He spent a lot of time in Florence between 1504 and 1508, and was greatly influenced by the works of the painters Fra Bartolommeo, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo and Masaccio. During this time he completed three large altarpieces, the ‘Ansidei Madonna’, the ‘Baglioni’ altarpiece, and the ‘Madonna del Baldacchino’.
  
• He moved to Rome in 1508. The new Pope Julius II commissioned him to fresco, which was intended to become the Pope's private library at the Vatican Palace. Several other artists were already working on different rooms of the library, and ‘The Stanza della segnatura’ ("Room of the Signatura") was the first to be decorated by Raphael's frescoes.
  
• One of his most famous paintings, ‘La donna velata’ ("The woman with the veil"), was completed in 1514–15. The painting portrays a beautiful young woman, traditionally identified as his Roman mistress, dressed in finery, depicting opulence.
  
• He established a workshop and had around 50 pupils and assistants. He is credited to have run his workshop in the most efficient manner and several of his students became famous artists in their own right.
  
• His last painting was ‘The Transfiguration’ in 1520. The painting stands as an allegory of the transformative nature of representation, and exemplifies Raphael's development as an artist.

On View

• The Louvre, Paris
• National Gallery of Art East Building, Washington D.C.
• Uffizi Gallery, Florence
• National Gallery London
• Museum of Fine Arts, Budapest
• Albertina
• Museo Nacional Del Prado, Madrid
• Dulwich Picture Gallery
• Chateau de Chantilly, Chantilly
• Palazzo Pitti, Florence
• Germadegalerie, Berlin
• Walters Art Museum, Baltimore
• Kunsthistorische Museum, Vienna
• Gemaldegalerie Alte Meister, Dresden
• Museum of Applied Arts,
• Musee Conde, Chantilly
• Victoria and Albert Museum, London

ArtWorks

Disputation of the Holy Sacrament

The painting, which shows the image of church spanning both earth and heaven, is one of the most well-known frescoes painted by Raphael.

Galatea

In Greek mythology, the beautiful Nereid (ocean spirit) Galatea is a daughter of Poseidon. She had the misfortune of being married to the jealous one-eyed giant Polyphemus, who kills the peasant shepherd Acis on finding out that Galatea has fallen in love with him. Rather than painting the events of the story, Raphael painted the scene of Galatea’s apotheosis (elevation to divine status).

La Belle Jardiniere

Raphael popularity during his time was not due to his major works but due to the numerous small pictures he painted of the Madonna and Christ Child. They remain hugely popular even today and the most famous of them is La belle jardinière (“The Madonna of the Beautiful Garden”). The painting which shows calm faced Madonna in an informal pose with Christ and the young John the Baptist has become a quintessential example of Raphael’s work.

La Donna Veltata

Raphael’s famous portrait La Donna Velata highlights the artist’s amazing ability to paint with such exquisite perfection that it appears to the viewer that he/she is staring not at a painting but at the real person. The woman’s apparel in the painting shows Raphael’s attention to detail which contributes in bringing the painting to life. The subject of the painting is Raphael’s mistress Margarita Luti. Little is known about her and that has added to the fame of the painting.

Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione

One of the greatest portraits of the Renaissance, the painting depicts Raphael’s friend, the diplomat and humanist Baldassare Castiglione, who is considered a quintessential example of the High Renaissance gentleman. According to art historian James Beck “The Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione stands as a final solution for single male portraiture within the Renaissance style….” The painting had a lasting influence on future artists including Titian, Rembrandt and Matisse.

Saint George and the Dragon

This painting which depicts the well-known legend of Saint George slaying the dragon is perhaps the most famous work on the subject. It was one of the most popular paintings in the Imperial Hermitage Museum in Russia for a century and a half before it found its way to the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C. where it remains as one of the prime attractions.

Sistine Madonna

Sistine Madonna depicts the Madonna, holding the Christ Child and flanked by Saint Sixtus and Saint Barbara. Also there are two winged cherubs beneath Mary who are perhaps the most famous cherubs depicted in any picture. Such is there popularity that there are many legends regarding how Raphael painted them and they have reproduced on everything from paper table napkins to umbrellas.

The-Marriage-of-the-Virgin

Based on the painting on the same theme by his teacher Pietro Perugino, Raphael’s The Marriage of the Virgin depicts a marriage ceremony between Mary and Joseph. Raphael’s developing style can be seen through this painting in which he surpasses his master. The temple in the background “is drawn in perspective with such evident care that it is marvellous to behold the difficulty of the problems which he has there set himself to solve.”

The School of Athens

Raphael’s masterpiece, The School of Athens, is one of the four main frescoes on the walls of the Stanze di Raffaello, in the Apostolic Palace in the Vatican. The four paintings epitomize Philosophy, Poetry, Theology, and Law; with The School of Athens representing Philosophy.

Transfiguration

Transfiguration is the last painting created by Raphael. It is divided into two distinct parts. The upper half of the painting shows the transfiguration of Christ with the prophets Elijah and Moses on either side of him. In the lower portion, the Apostles are unsuccessfully trying to rid the possessed boy of demons. The upper portion also shows the transfigured Christ ridding the possessed boy from evil.