Raphael – The Divine
Raphael was born in Urbino, Italy. His father was the artist and poet Giovanni Santi and it was from him that Raphael received his introduction to the world of art. He had a natural talent and learned quickly. The Renaissance art historian Giorgio Vasari reports that, while still very young, Raphael was apprenticed to Pietro Perugino, one of the first Italian artists to use oil paints in a significant manner. Raphael’s early works, in which static figures are painted in rich, bold colors offset by pale, shimmering landscapes, certainly reflect Perugino’s style.
In 1504 Raphael started visiting Florence in order to study the works of established masters such as Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Fra Bartolommeo. From them he learned anatomy, perspective and the use of light and shade. Fra Bartolomeo persuaded him to adopt a bolder, more monumental style of painting. The paintings produced during those four years are known as the Florentine period and vary greatly in nature and scale. He painted numerous idealized portraits of Madonnas and large-scale religious works.
In 1508, when Raphael was only 25 years old, Pope Julius II commissioned him to produce a series of frescoes for four state rooms of the Vatican Palace, known as the Stanze. The most famous of these works is The School of Athens, depicting the philosophers of the Ancient World. In this fresco he pays homage to his contemporaries by interspersing the figures of Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci and Bramante as philosophers debating with Plato, Aristotle and Socrates.
In 1514, Pope Leo X, the successor of Julius II, appointed Raphael chief architect of Saint Peter’s Basilica and a year later made him Superintendent of Antiquities in the Rome area. Under the patronage of Leo X, Raphael was commissioned to design ten tapestries for the Sistine Chapel depicting scenes from the lives of the Apostles. The drawings, or cartoons, for these tapestries are now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.
By this time, Raphael was considered to be the most important painter and architect in Rome. Among the magnificent altarpieces he produced during those years is the famous Sistine Madonna, where the Virgin and Child appear surrounded by radiant clouds above two delightful cherubs whose appeal has survived the ages. He also produced some of his finest portraits. The style he used for the portrait of the aged Pope Julius II is credited with revolutionizing the art of portrait painting.
Raphael never married, but the love of his life was a beauty known as La Fornarina – the baker’s daughter, whom he painted in a sensual pose.
You can find a wide collection of Raphael paint by number patterns at the Segmation web site. These patterns may be viewed, painted, and printed using SegPlay™PC a fun, computerized paint-by-numbers program for Windows 2000, XP, and Vista.
About the Author
Mark Feldman is President of
SegTech, a company devoted to a wonderful Image Segmentation technology called Segmation.
Segmation – The Art of Pieceful Imaging
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