This documentary on Raphael edges towards the hysterical at times and the segments where modern artists recreate his works seem obscure. But it is well made and gives a good idea of how brilliant the famous painter and architect was. The suggestion that Raphael died of syphilis is also unfounded. The sudden onset of his fever and the rapid decline he experienced seems to suggest it was an acute infection, possibly pneumonia and that the blood letting that was prescribed, a common practice at the time, weakened him to the point of death.
Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino (Italian: [raffaˈɛllo ˈsantsjo da urˈbiːno]; March 28 or April 6, 1483 – April 6, 1520), known as Raphael (/ˈræfeɪəl/, US: /ˈræfiəl, ˈreɪf-, ˌrɑːfaɪˈɛl, ˌrɑːfiˈɛl/), 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 early 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.
After his death, the influence of his great rival Michelangelo was more widespread until the 18th and 19th centuries, when Raphael's more serene and harmonious qualities were again regarded as the highest models. His career falls naturally into three phases and three styles, first described by Giorgio Vasari: his early years in Umbria, then a period of about four years (1504–1508) absorbing the artistic traditions of Florence, followed by his last hectic and triumphant twelve years in Rome, working for two Popes and their close associates.
Raphael saved the Coliseum, the homes on the Palatine Hill, the Forum and the Curia, the arch of Constantine and various temples and many others.
On Good Friday, April 6th, 1520, Raffaello Sanzio, one of the greatest painters of the Renaissance, died. Raphael, as he is known in English speaking circles, had asked to be buried in the Pantheon, and his request was granted, making him the first artist to be accorded such an honour.
Raphael's epitaph hails him as a preeminent painter and rival of the ancients; it also implies that he died on his birthday, which may or may not be true. Vasari simply states that Raphael was born on Good Friday, 1483, which in that year fell on March 28th. However, another source states that he was born on April 6th.
By the 19th century Raphael had become a cult figure and on September 14th, 1833, Pope Gregory XVI (r. 1831-46) ordered that his tomb be opened to verify that the artist was really buried there. The tomb was opened in the presence of a host of distinguished figures from the worlds of art, the church, politics and medicine. A skeleton was discovered and the doctors declared (on what grounds?) that this was, indeed, the earthly remains of Raphael. The event was duly recorded in a painting by Francesco Diofebi (1771-851).
The skeleton was transferred to an ancient sarcophagus, a gift from the pope, on which were inscribed the last two lines of his epitaph: 'Ille hic est Raffael, timuit quo sospite vinci, rerum magna parens et moriente mori.' They have been attributed to Pietro Bembo (1470-1547), a Venetian humanist, scholar and writer, who first met Raphael at the court of Urbino.
The couplet was beautifully translated by the English poet, Alexander Pope (1688-1744), in the last two lines of his Epitaph on Sir Godfrey Kneller (1723): ‘Living, great Nature feared he might outvye Her works; and, dying, fears herself may dye.’ Kneller, who was a very successful German portrait painter, is interred in Westminster Abbey, London.
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