Download Raphael Biography - Silver Wolf Foreign Language

Raphael Biography
Raphael (Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino) (1483 – April 6, 1520), was a great Italian painter. Together
with Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael makes up the great trinity of the
High Renaissance period. He was noted for his clarity of form and ability to convey grandeur,
beauty and perfection.
Short Biography Raphael
Raphael was born in the Italian city of Urbino in the Marches area
of Italy. His father was a court painter and Raphael followed in his
father’s footsteps – gaining a wide education in the arts,
literature, and social skills. This enabled Raphael to move easily
amongst the higher circles of court society and this helped his
career in gaining commissions. Compared to Michelangelo,
Raphael was more at ease in social circles; he didn’t have the
same brusqueness that got Michelangelo into trouble. His style
was also considered more refined. He didn’t have the same
inventive genius of Michelangelo or Leonardo da Vinci, but he had
a supreme grace of painting. He concentrated on a more classical
interpretation of
perfection, but was
still somewhat
influenced by the contemporary Florence
tradition.
By 1501, Raphael was held in high esteem and he
gained important commissions, such as the Mond
de Crucifixion in 1503.
From about 1504, Raphael lived mainly in
Florence, which was a burgeoning centre of the
renaissance. He became acquainted with Leonardo
da Vinci and Michelangelo (whom he fell out with
on numerous occasions)
Crocefissione – Raphael 
In 1508, he was invited to Rome by Pope Julius II.
The pope asked Raphael to paint some rooms in
the Vatican. This was at the same time as
Michelangelo was painting the Sistine Chapel, and
although the Sistine chapel overshadowed the
work of Raphael, his paintings are still considered
some of the finest of European art. This work
included some of masterpieces such as – The
School of Athens, The Parnassus and the Disputa.
The High Renaissance tribute to
the ancient Greek culture. 1511
As well as being a great painter,
Raphael was also a noted teacher,
who could inspire his fellow pupils
to greater standards. He had one
of the largest art schools in Rome,
with over 50 pupils. His
enthusiasm and talent helped his
school become a famous place of
art.
As well as a painter, Raphael was
also a noted architect, drawer, and
with Raimondi a printmaker of his
engravings.
The School of Athens
The School of Athens represents all the greatest mathematicians, philosophers and scientists from classical
antiquity gathered together sharing their ideas and learning from each other. These figures all lived at different
times, but here they are gathered together under one roof.
The two thinkers in the very center, Aristotle (on the right) and Plato (on the left, pointing up) have been
enormously important to Western thinking generally, and in different ways, their different philosophies were
incoporated into Christianity. Plato holds his book called The Timaeus.
Plato points up because in his philosophy the changing world that we see around us is just a shadow of a
higher, truer reality that is eternal and unchanging (and include things like goodness and beauty). For Plato, this
otherworldly reality is the ultimate reality, and the seat of all truth, beauty, justice, and wisdom.
Aristotle holds his hand down, because in his philosophy, the only reality is the reality that we can see and
experience by sight and touch (exactly the reality dismissed by Plato). Aristotle's Ethics (the book that he holds)
"emphasized the relationships, justice, friendship, and government of the human world and the need to study it."
Pythagoras (lower left) believed that the world (including the movement of the planets and stars) operated
according to mathematical laws. These mathematical laws were related to ideas of musical and cosmic harmony,
and thus (for the Christians who interpreted him in the Renaissance) to God. Pythagoras taught that each of the
planets produced a note as it moved, based on its distance from the earth. Together, the movement of all the
planets was perfect harmony -- "the harmony of the spheres."
Ptolemy (he has his back to us on the lower right), holds a sphere of the earth, next to him is Zaroaster who
holds a celestial sphere. Ptolemy tried to mathematically explain the
movements of the planets (which was not easy since some of them
appear to move backwards!). His theory of how they all moved around
the earth remained the authority until Copernicus and Kepler figured out
(in the late 1500s) that the earth was not at the center of the universe,
and that the planets moved in orbits the shape of ellipses not in circles.
Raphael included a self-portrait of himself, standing next to
Ptolemy. He looks right out at us.