RAFFAELLO Sanzio
Italian High Renaissance Painter, 1483-1520
Italian painter and architect. As a member of Perugino's workshop, he established his mastery by 17 and began receiving important commissions. In 1504 he moved to Florence, where he executed many of his famous Madonnas; his unity of composition and suppression of inessentials is evident in The Madonna of the Goldfinch (c. 1506). Though influenced by Leonardo da Vinci's chiaroscuro and sfumato, his figure types were his own creation, with round, gentle faces that reveal human sentiments raised to a sublime serenity. In 1508 he was summoned to Rome to decorate a suite of papal chambers in the Vatican. The frescoes in the Stanza della Segnatura are probably his greatest work; the most famous, The School of Athens (1510 C 11), is a complex and magnificently ordered allegory of secular knowledge showing Greek philosophers in an architectural setting. The Madonnas he painted in Rome show him turning away from his earlier work's serenity to emphasize movement and grandeur, partly under Michelangelo's High Renaissance influence. The Sistine Madonna (1513) shows the richness of colour and new boldness of compositional invention typical of his Roman period. He became the most important portraitist in Rome, designed 10 large tapestries to hang in the Sistine Chapel, designed a church and a chapel, assumed the direction of work on St. Peter's Basilica at the death of Donato Bramante,
ID: 63802 Apollo and Marsyas 1509-11 Fresco, 120 x 105 cm Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican The shepherd Marsyas had challenged the god Apollo to a musical contest. Marsyas lost and as a punishment for daring to challenge a god he was flayed alive. The scene is an allegory of divine harmony triumphing over earthly passion. With its unrhythmical composition and its elongated figures, this scene is probably by an unknown hand, and not by Raphael.Artist:RAFFAELLO Sanzio Title: Apollo and Marsyas (ceiling panel) Painted in 1501-1550 , Italian - - painting : mythological
