Raphael
Raphael was the artist who most closely resembled Pheidias. The Greeks said that the latter invented nothing; rather, he carried every kind of art invented by his forerunners to such a pitch of perfection that he achieved pure and perfect harmony. Those words, “pure and perfect harmony,” express, in fact, better than any others what Raphael brought to Italian art. From Perugino, he gathered all the weak grace and gentility of the Umbrian School, he acquired strength and certainty in Florence, and he created a style based on the fusion of Leonardo's and Michelangelo's lessons under the light of his own noble spirit. His compositions on the traditional theme of the Virgin and Child seemed intensely novel to his contemporaries, and only their time-honoured glory prevents us now from perceiving their originality. He has an even more magnificent claim in the composition and realisation of those frescos with which, from 1509, he adorned the Stanze and the Loggia at the Vatican. The sublime, which Michelangelo attained by his ardour and passion, Raphael attained by the sovereign balance of intelligence and sensibility. One of his masterpieces, The School of Athens, was created by genius: the multiple detail, the portrait heads, the suppleness of gesture, the ease of composition, the life circulating everywhere within the light are his most admirable and identifiable traits.
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Biography
1483: Raffaello Santi or Sanzio, known as Raphael, is born in Urbino, probably on the 6th of April. He is the son of Giovanni Santi, a painter and official poet at the court of the great patron of the arts Federico da Montefeltro.
1491: Death of Raphael’s mother. He is deeply affected by the event.
1494: His father also dies. He is taken in by his uncle, a priest.
1495: The young artist arrives in Perugia and supposedly becomes one of the disciples of Pietro Vannucci, known as Perugino.
1501: The artist finishes the first work known to be his, the altar of the church of San Nicola da Tolentino, at Castello, in Umbria.
1504–1508: He spends several years in Florence, which is later known as his Florentine period. He discovers the works of Leonardo and Michelangelo, which influence him strongly. Raphael paints many pictures of the Virgin Mary, in particular The Madonna of the Goldfinch (1506), The Madonna of the Pinks (1506–1507) and The Madonna and Child with Infant St John the Baptist, often called La Belle Jardinière (1507–1508).
1508: He leaves for Rome where he settles permanently. Pope Julius II asks him to decorate the Stanze della Segnatura at the Vatican. They contain two major works: the School of Athens and Disputation over the Most Holy Sacrament.
1512: Raphael takes up architecture. He plans, designs, and supervises the construction of a chapel for Agostino Chigi.
1514: He finishes the decoration of another room in the Vatican, the Stanza dell’Eliodoro. The artist’s popularity is now such that he receives many commissions. Most are finished by his assistants, so much work does he have. His workload increases even more when he is asked to finish St Peter’s Basilica, following the death of his mentor and friend, the architect Bramante.
1515: Raphael paints the Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, probably with the help of his assistants.
1516: Cardinal Giuliano de’ Medici commissions the altarpiece of the Transfiguration. He will work on it until his death and it will then be finished by one of his pupils.
1517: Raphael is appointed superintendent of antiquities in Rome by Pope Leo X. He immediately begins an inventory of the ancient monuments in the city.
Still working for the Pope, he completes a series of ten cartoons for tapestries for the Sistine Chapel. These are later woven by Pieter van Aelst in Brussels.
1518–1519: He paints one of his masterpieces, the Portrait of Leo × with Cardinals Giulio de’ Medici and Luigi de’ Rossi. It is perhaps his only late work done entirely without the help of his assistants.
The Fornarina is also painted during this period, inspired by the baker’s daughter with whom Raphael is supposed to have been hopelessly in love.
1520: Raphael dies of a fever on the 6th of April, his thirty-seventh birthday. As he is by then wealthy and admired, his funeral is held in the Vatican and his body buried in Rome at the Pantheon.
Birth of Raphael and his First Works
On the 6th of April 1483, Raphael, who would carry to such heights of glory the name of Santi, was born in Urbino, Italy. His father, Giovanni Santi, gave him the name of an archangel, as though guessing the celestial splendour to which his son would rise. Giovanni was a modest and thrifty member of the middle class, ready to accept any commission, provided it was well remunerated.
Angel Holding a Phylactery (fragment of the Baronci Altarpiece)
1500–1501
Oil on wood, 58 × 36 cm
Musée du Louvre, Paris
To judge him only by his ordinary occupations, one would be tempted to take him for an artisan rather than an artist, so diverse and varied were his activities. But this worker, so humble in appearance, had travelled extensively. He had studied the works of the most famous masters; he possessed the secrets of the trade and stopped at nothing in order to remain abreast of new methods. He had observed and read widely, and the names of the humanists were familiar to him.
The Crucified Christ with the Virgin Mary, Saints and Angels (The Mond Crucifixion)
c. 1502–1503
Oil on poplar wood, 283.3 × 167.3 cm
The National Gallery, London
Given Giovanni Santi’s tastes, we may assume that, in addition to a very careful artistic education, his son received a good and solid literary one as well. Raphael lost his mother at the age of eight, and his father four years later. In spite of Giovanni Santi’s premature death, knowledgeable judges see several similarities of style between the works of the father and those of his son. It is quite probable that Raphael received some lessons from his father. How was the interval separating the death of Giovanni Santi and Raphael’s departure for Perugia filled?
The Madonna and Child with a Book
c. 1502–1503
Oil on wood, 55.2 × 40 cm
Norton Simon Museum of Art, Pasadena, California
It is probable that in his native city the boy received lessons from his compatriot Timoteo Viti. This capable painter, whose value should, nonetheless, not be exaggerated, had returned to Urbino in 1495 after solid studies done in Bologna in the workshop of Francia. A tender friendship immediately united the two artists. In his period of grandeur, Raphael did not forget the companion of his youth; he called him to him in Rome, and asked for his help in the execution of the
