FEATURE Image: Raphael, Portraits of Agnolo Doni and Maddalena Doni, c. 1506, oil on panel, 24  ¾  x 17 ¾” Pitti Gallery, Florence.

INTRODUCTION.

Born in Urbino in 1483, an environment rich in the arts and humanist learning, Raphael had a remarkable capacity for personal growth and branded new incarnations of his artistic style regularly. He moved to Florence toward the end of 1504. Giorgio Vasari in his chapter on Raphael describes an episode where the artist of Urbino, already in his thirties with a reputation as a master, went back to study the nude (male) form with Michelangelo as his guide. Vasari’s admiration in telling this story goes beyond Raphael’s humility in assuming the role of student again (he studied constantly anyway) but that his learning always improved his artistic output. In the study of nudes, however, artistic growth came perhaps not as the artist expected or intended. Whether Raphael entered the workshop of Perugino at that time or, as seems more likely, many years later when he was already an acknowledged artist, he quickly mastered Perugino’s delicate, ornamental style, with its open landscapes and gentle figures. It was said that contemporaries had trouble distinguishing Perugino’s work from Raphael’s, but Raphael’s compositions were more sophisticated even when he was a young artist. While Raphael mastered Michelangelo’s (and Leonardo’s) art forms convincingly, he also realized he was no match for the creator of the Sistine Chapel and other chiseled works insofar as the nude male forms.¹ Yet Raphael consolidated his strengths by testing his limits. A major strength, Vasari believed, was Raphael’s ability to draw and compose a wide range of subjects, such as landscape, architecture, draperies, and the human figure. Up to that time that had been what the artist was doing and would now unflinchingly continue to do on a grander scale, for example, in the Stanzae. In 1508 the pope called Raphael to Rome. Influenced by the idealized, classical art of the city’s ancient past, Raphael’s work took on a new grandeur. He also responded to the more energetic and physical style of Michelangelo, whose works he had already begun to study in Florence. Vasari believed Raphael had the gift to congeal the “poetic moment” by depicting in his painting the most significant gesture and force of action. With the possible exception of Leonardo, he is probably the unparalleled master of excellent design.² The precocious Raphael Sanzio also benefited from early opportunities given to him by his father to cultivate his talent. The artist’s own determination to succeed in his métier paid off when he was summoned to work at the Vatican by the Pope in 1509, arguably the greatest art patron in an age of art patrons. ³ The early sixteenth century was an age where patrons were as luminous as their artists and the coming together of Raphael and Julius II, and later Leo X, made for a celebrity team. While Vasari meticulously tells the reader of the artist’s “judicious” character – and that Raphael was extremely “amatory” and implying it aided in his death – the chronicler describes, often from memory, his preferences in Raphael’s art work.  His collective response, for example, to all four frescos in the Camera d’Eliodoro is that he is most impressed by Raphael’s interesting decorative details, beautiful movements and gestures, the sheer number of figures portrayed, and his ability to express complex ideas and stories on a two-dimensional surface.⁴ With Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) and Michelangelo (1475-1564) Raphael is one of the great masters of the High Renaissance. Raphael and his large team of assistants left behind a large body of influential work, especially in the Vatican where the artist spent the last 12 years of his life, although Raphael died at 37 years old. For most of the history of Western art, the easy grace and harmonious balance of Raphael’s style has represented an ideal of perfection. His work became widely influential through the dissemination of prints. Raphael was also the city’s leading portraitist, creating penetrating psychological images that engaged viewer and sitter with a new intensity.

ARTWORKS.

The Baronci Altarpiece is Raphael’s first recorded commission. It was made for the patron’s chapel in the church of Sant’Agostino in Città di Castello, a commune between Arezzo and Urbino, north of Perugia. In 1789 the artwork was badly damaged in an earthquake and surviving fragments were acquired by the Vatican until they mysteriously dispersed in the mid-19^th century and found their way into different collections. Raphael’s commission of 1501 was to paint a large altarpiece dedicated to the Augustinian saint Nicholas of Tolentino (c. 1246– September 10, 1305). Nicholas was canonized by Augustinian Pope Eugene IV in 1446.  While today’s saints require 1-2 miracles, St. Nicolas Tolentino was credited at his canonization with 300 miracles – including 3 resurrections. (see – Encyclopedia of the Middle Ages, Volume 2, André Vauchez, Richard Barrie Dobson, Michael Lapidge. Chicago: Fitzroy, Dearborn, 2000).

The painting was done in 1503 for Domenico Gavari for his S. Domenico chapel in Città di Castello. Angels are poised on toes on a cloud as their cups catch Christ’s dripping blood. Mary Magdelene and St. Jerome (holding a rock) are on their knees while the Virgin Mary and St. John stand. The sun and moon in the sky was characteristic of Crucifixion paintings in Umbria (p. 13, Jones & Penny). It was bequeathed to the National Gallery in 1924. Gavari was a close friend of Andrea Baronci, for whom Raphael painted the Saint Nicholas of Tolentino Altarpiece for the church of S. Agostino, also in Città di Castello. Saint Jerome, of course, was not present at the Crucifixion but is included in this scene because the chapel was dedicated to him. The overall design is based on several versions of the crucified Christ in a landscape painted by Perugino in the late 1480s and 1490s, and is especially similar to his altarpiece of the Crucifixion for the convent of S. Francesco al Monte in Perugia, commissioned in 1502 and completed 1506. https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/raphael-the-mond-crucifixion – retrieved September 5, 2024.

Raphael painted altarpieces for the Augustinians and Dominicans and the Oddi altarpiece (above) was done for the Franciscans. It was commissioned by the Oddi family chapel in S. Francesco al Prato. The Oddi were in exile from Perugia since 1495 because of battles between families and returned in 1503. The altarpiece was part of honoring their family members. The painting is divided into an upper part depicting the coronation of the Virgin and, in the lower part, the Apostles at the time of the Assumption. In the center, the apostle Thomas holds the Virgin’s girdle that the Virgin lowered to him as a token of these supernatural events. This display of theology was precious to the Franciscans at the time who were promoting the Virgin Mary. They were likely very involved in directing the artist in its composition. (Roger & Jones, pp. 15-16).

The painting’s composition reflects the influence of Perugino, specifically the fresco done by him in the Sistine Chapel in 1484. In terms of its architectural setting, Raphael was influenced by Piero della Francesca (c.1416-1492) and Bramante (1444-1514). The painting’s architectural structure shares centrality in the painting with the foreground figures done in a perspectival arrangement. Within the figures are members of the party positioned in depth. Joseph places a ring on Mary’s finger whose positioning bisects the artwork. A tawny gold tone pervades the painting. It was commissioned by the Alberini family for a chapel in S. Francesco of the Friars Minor at Città di Castello in Perugia. (Brera Milan, p 34)

Raphael painted this altarpiece for the Franciscan convent of Sant’Antonio in Perugia. It hung in a part of the church reserved for the nuns. The pair of voluminous saints straddling each side of the throne reflect the progressive style of Leonardo da Vinci and Fra Bartolomeo (1472-1517) that Raphael was studying in Florence. The lunette above the main panel depicts God the Father holding a globe and raising his right hand in blessing situated between two angels and two seraphim. https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/437372 – retrieved September 5, 2024.

The Cowper Madonna includes an agreeable background landscape. In a vertical painting, a haloed woman and nude child sit before an expansive grass field extending behind them to a group of trees and buildings on a hill in the distance among hazy blue hills beneath a blue sky. https://www.nga.gov/collection/art-object-page.1196.html – retrieved September 8, 2024.

These early works by the artist depict the popular subjects of St. Michael the Archangel vanquishing Satan and Saint George slaying the Dragon, each showing the martial subject of good combatting evil. These were early private commissions for the court of Urbino. Saint George was a Christian Roman soldier who, pious legend informs, subdued a dragon and, with the daughter of a pagan king, brought it to the city, where St. George killed it with his sword. These heroic actions witnessed by the king and his subjects led to their conversion to Christianity. The historic figure of Saint George was martyred around the year 290.  https://www.nga.gov/collection/art-object-page.28.html – retrieved September 4, 2024.

The panel was recorded in the Borghese collection in 1650. It accompanied the Dream of Scipio, an oil on panel, today in the National Gallery of London. The figures were derived from ancient classical sculpture and depict, likely, Chastity, Beauty and Love. Chastity’s lower torso is veiled and an arm covers her breasts from view. Amor’s breasts, by contrast, are revealed. Chastity also wears no adornment as do Beauty and Amor. While the figures are modeled similarly, the space between them is disparate and Beauty blocks Chastity’s leg. (Jones & Penny, p. 8; Beck, pp. 62-63).

Agnolo Doni is the only Florentine portrait in these first years mentioned by Vasari though paired with its companion portrait of Maddalena Doni. Doni was an art collector who married the daughter of Giovanni Strozzi in 1503. Agnolo was 10 years older than his wife who was in her teens. The portraits are painted on identically sized panel and are intended to hang next to one another. Raphael took great care in depicting the corporeal reality of his subjects, particularly appreciated in their faces and hands (though Agnolo Doni’s portrait is more detailed than his wife’s.) In both Doni portraits the sitters show-off their jewelry – such as rings and, in Maddalena’s portrait, a large pearl hanging around her neck. (Roger & Penny, p. 29-30)

The work was of uncertain attribution until recent times. In the 1760 inventory of the Gallery, the subject of the painting was identified as Saint Catherine of Alexandria and attributed to Perugino. A restoration of the painting in 1934 revealed a unicorn, the medieval symbol for chastity, and led to the pianting’s attribution to Raphael. In 1959 an x-ray revealed a small dog under the unicorn which symbolized conjugal fidelity.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Woman_with_Unicorn – retrieved September 7, 2024.

Visible on the hem of the Madonna’s scarf is inscribed, “Rapahel Urbanas.” The fresco and easel painter was active mainly in Umbria, in Florence after 1504, and in Rome in 1509 until his death. It was painted for Domenico Canigiani where Vasari saw it later. It entered the Medici collection and when a Medici daughter married an Elector Palatine it accompanied her over the Alps to Germany. (Pinakothek Munich Great Museums of the World, Roberto Salvini, et. al., Newsweek NY 1969 pp. 126).

The three figures are closely integrated as well as displaying a greater sense of volume. The painting is dated 1507, again on the hem of the Virgin’s garment. In the painting St. John the Baptist presents a goldfinch (cardellino) to the Christ child – a symbol of the Passion. (Roger & Penny, p. 33)

Upon seeing Leonardo’s Battle of Anghiari and Michelangelo’s Battle of Cascia in Florence Raphael’s style applied its innovative principles immediately changing the trajectory of his artwork up to that point. Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo were in a pitched artistic battle for the future of modern art in the first decade of the 16th century in central Italy. Their artwork was for a fabled competition to decorate the Great Council Hall in Florence. Raphael studied closely these complex drawings of heroic violence. Though Raphael was familiar with violent combat in Perugia and elsewhere, it was its containment in these artworks in Florence that such dynamic convolutions appeared as in his own work such as The Deposition though he may have had in mind also Perugino’s work in 1495 of the Lamentation over the Dead Christ. In the finished painting the action takes place from right to left –  a group of women attending to a swooning Virgin to the Magdalene grasping Christ’s hand to look into his
face.  (Roger & Penny, pp. 37-44).

In this painting John the Baptist kneels before the Christ child. The painting has an arched top. It was Leonardo da Vinci who formulated the pyramidal structure for the Holy Family and half-length portrait and it seems Raphael looked to explore his idea for his narrative of the Virgin Mary with cousins Jesus Christ and John the Baptist. (Roger & Penny, p. 33)

The painting was started by Raphael and finished after his death (Roger & Penny, p. 44). It was Raphael’s first major commission in Florence for the Dei family chapel in the Santo Spirito basilica (1487) and remained unfinished when the 25-year-old artist was summoned to Rome by Pope Julius II, nicknamed the Fearsome, who reigned on Peter’s chair from 1503 to 1513. Pope Julius, born Giuliano della Rovere in 1443, took his name specifically from Julius Caesar (d. 44 BCE). In 1508, this “Battle Pope” as he was also known, commissioned the Raphael Rooms and Michelangelo’s paintings in the Sistine Chapel at the Vatican. Raphael’s enthroned Madonna and Child is with, from left, Sts. Peter, Bernard of Clairvaux, James the Greater and St. Augustine of Hippo. The group is joined by two putti at the foot of the throne’s high pedestal steps. It is a large format painting whose size was increased when it was restored and “completed” at the end of the 17th century to meet the tastes of a Medici prince. Raphael is cited for being an imitator more than originator and this is exampled in the Christ Child playing with his toes whose pudgy type derives from the workshop of Florentine sculptor Luca Della Robbia (c. 1400-1482). The painting can be read right to left as St. Augustine, looking at the viewer, gestures, with St. James gazing in a similar direction, towards the throne and its occupants and then crosses to St. Bernard whose backward glance ends in conversation with St. Peter holding a book and large key. Once in Rome, Raphael continued these simple straight forward readings of his artworks’ often complex network of figures beginning in his famous frescoes in the Stanza della Segnatura (1508-1511) yet by then with greater refinement and heroism. In 1799 The Madonna of the Baldacchino was confiscated by French forces and taken to Paris only to be returned to Florence in 1813.  (Beck, pp. 78-79).

Raphael’s saint, a 4^TH century mystic and martyr, is not an object for devotion but dramatizes an example of devotion. The turned figure derives from Leonardo da Vinci and expresses an emotional animation that is one of the strongest depictions in Raphael’s oeuvre. (Roger & Penny, p. 44). The portrait is joined to a landscape as the saint leans on a spiked wheel which is her symbol as it was the manner of her death. Raphael looks to capture the mystical or visionary aspect of the saint as she places her hand over her heart and gazes upwards to a golden break in the sky. The figure is very dynamic moving beyond Perugino’s influence of angelic air and distant landscapes and towards Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci whose monumentality and detailed arrangements Raphael studied in Florence. It is unknown who commissioned the artwork and for exactly what purpose it served.  https://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/paintings/raphael-saint-catherine-of-alexandria – retrieved September 6, 2024.

At the time of the papal commission Raphael had little experience painting large frescos but would revolutionize the tradition. The basic scheme of the decoration presents four tondi of abstract ideas of Theology, Poetry, Philosophy and Law. The Fall  – or Adam and Eve on the Brink of Disobedience along with the Judgment of Solomon on the ceiling relates to themes of Theology and Law as the ceiling’s admixture of pagan scenes including Urania and Apollo and Marsyas relate to Poetry and Philosophy.  (Roger & Penny – pp 50-52).

Raphael’s artwork has the effect of cinema in presenting nearly life-sized figures in space that, hoisted onto the wall like a massive theatre screen, fills the room’s field of vision. Further, as a modern-day film dispels incredulity to its medium and any message it conveys, absorbing the viewer, Raphael’s fresco makes intensely real the Catholic faith.  Angels in the vault accompany God the Father as a white-robed God the Son sits enthroned before a golden disc displaying his sacrificial wounds of the Cross. On each side sit the Virgin Mary and St. John the Baptist while on the raised tier sits figures from the Bible. The Holy Spirit descends in the form of a dove on the monstrance holding the Eucharist. Many preparatory drawings survive for this fresco. (Roger & Penny, pp.57-58)

Raphael creatively adapted figures or figural groupings from one fresco to another. Raphael also utilized Michaelangelo’s newly publicly accessible Sistine Chapel ceiling’s prophets and sibyls. Beyond Michaelangelo, Raphael was interested in foreshortening and also arranging numerous figures in a mathmatically constructed perspectival space. Compared to the architecture in his Spozalizio from 1504, Raphael’s architecture in The School of Athens is more massive and yet whose angular lines are softened by curvacious colossal statues in niches. One statue is Minerva above Jurisprudence while Apollo is on the left (and closest to the Parnassus fresco). The central figures below the arches, open sky behind them, are Plato with his Timaeus and Aristotle with his Ethics. Other recognizable figures include Socrates to the left of Plato and Pythagoras to the right of the door. Euclid bends down to use one of his compasses surrounded by students and disciples. (Roger & Penny p 74-78).

Raphael painted a poet’s paradise where Apollo has the central place. The window which interupts the base of the artwork looked out onto a hill in Rome called Mons Vaticanus that was known since classical times as sacred to Apollo. This fact with the fresco’s other siting challenges (window glare) Raphael was well aware of. Apollo plays the fiddle surrounded by poets and gorgeous muses with a background of laurel trees. Mortals are below on either side of the window. (Roger & Penny, pp. 68-69)

Raphael was working on the frescos in the Vatican Palace when he painted this oil on panel portrait of a “Young Cardinal.” The sitter is not known though it likely is Cardinal Francesco Alidosi (1455-1511). Cdl. Alidosi was an influential diplomat and military leader and a favorite of Julius II (1503-1513). The sitter’s expression and pose of a resting arm on the edge of the painting’s base and the slight turn of the body seems to owe much to Leonardo da Vinci. The body is monumental compared to a placid and yet almost inscrutable slightly smaller head whose depiction, while directly observed, is somewhat idealized. When Della Rovere was elected as Pope Julius II in 1503, Alidosi became his secretary and primary collaborator. He was appointed papal chamberlain and then treasurer. Though labeled “unholy” by Venetian cardinal Pietro Bembo (1470-1547), Cld. Alidosi helped guide the vocation of Bl. Elena Duglioli dall’ Olio (1472-1520), an Italian aristocrat, who wanted to be a Poor Clare nun but was forced to marry by her family and for whose endowed chapel in Bologna Raphael painted an altar-piece. In 1504 Alidosi became a bishop whose sees ranged up and down all Italy – of Mileto in 1504 and of Pavia in 1505. He occupied the seat of Pavia until he was murdered in broad daylight in 1511. There were accusations traded back and forth that Cdl. Alidosi was a traitor in a time when the French occupied parts of Italy among its warring Italian families and an independently powerful pope who acted to protect his favorite as long as possible. About Alidosi, one historian noted, ”A favorite has no friends” and there were many unconcerned witnesses to the brutal crime whose attack included blows that split open his head. (Beck, pp. 92-93; Herbert M. Vaughan, B.A., The Medici Popes (Leo X and Clement VII), Methuen & Co., London, 1910, p. 64-65; “Alidosi, Francesco, detto il Cardinal di Pavia”. Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani – Volume 2 (in Italian). Treccani. 1960.)

For all his grandiose commissions for the pope and others, Raphael continued to paint Madonnas as he had in the past in Umbria and Florence and with all the creativity and variation in his powers. The Alba Madonna is clearly a Virgin of humility as she sits on the ground. The woman wears a rose-pink dress under a topaz-blue robe and a finger holds a page in a book she rests on her lap as her hair is twisted away from her face. The woman takes up most of the composition as she welcomes John the Baptist who, according to Christian theology, by his works in the desert and at the River Jordan is the figure who prepares and presents the Christ Child to the people with flowers from the fold of his loin cloth. The trio gazes at the cross held by the Christ Child, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world by his sacrifice as a proper offering to God, his Father. The rounded features of the Madonna figure are in harmony with the circular panel on which the scene is painted. Behind the figures is a wide plain of grass that edges to a body of water painted light turquoise with mountains in the distance painted a deeper shade of blue beneath a blue sky. (Roger & Penny, p. 88.) https://www.nga.gov/collection/art-object-page.26.html – retrieved September 4, 2024.

Raphael took a poem by Florentine poet Poliziano (1454-1494) for inspiration for this fresco. The poet gives a detailed description of the Palace of Venus. Galatea is described as riding on the sea in a chariot pulled by a pair of dolphins whose reins she holds. Around her is her entourage playing amorously in the sea. In 2007, the bodies of Poliziano and philosopher Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (1463-1464) were exhumed from Florence’s Church of San Marco to determine the causes of their deaths. Forensic tests showed that both men of letters likely were poisoned but how and by whom are only speculation. (see – http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6920443.stm – retrieved September 7, 2024). (Roger & Penny, p. 93).

The Stanza D’Eliodoro served as a Vatican audience chamber for the Pope. Each fresco depicts a story of divine intervention and the Pope felt impelled to record them like a civic authority would record an important battle scene in the town hall. The Pope had control over the message and even had himself inserted into these works and one of the best portraits of the pope by Raphael.⁵ Vasari believed that in the Expulsion of Heliodorus the message was clear: it was the Pope chasing avarice out of the church. Still others, more realistic perhaps, believed the theme to be the defense of the Church’s right to worldly possessions.⁶ While Julius II kept the treasury full and spent lavishly on public works, he also formally condemned his predecessor’s self-enrichment as well as the Church practice of buying and selling its offices. Others impute Pope Julius II making a parallel between Heliodorus’ expulsion and the Pope’s battle to expel rebellious cardinals who supported the French king against Rome.⁷ The first fresco painted in the Stanza D’Eliodoro and the one the room is named for is also, in my opinion, the finest: The Expulsion of Heliodorus. Heinrich Wölfflin in his book Classic Art provides the most satisfying brief account of this fresco, although there are other observers who offer insight and detail. The painting is based on an account found in 2 Maccabees, a book that treats of the events in Jewish history from the time of the high priest Onias III and King Seleucus IV to the defeat of Nicanor’s army (around 170 B.C). The biblical account of Heliodorus’ attempt to profane the Temple is a rich one and, in terms of the painting’s iconography, can be synopsized as such:

                  “There was great distress throughout the city. Priests prostrated themselves in their priestly robes before the altar, and loudly begged him in heaven…to keep the deposits safe for those who had made them…(T)he changed color of the (high priest’s) face manifested the anguish of his soul. The terror and bodily trembling that had come over the man clearly showed…People rushed out…in crowds to make public supplication because the Place was in danger of being profaned…Women, girded…filled the streets…While they were imploring the almighty Lord to keep the deposits safe and secure… Heliodorus went on with his plan. But just as he was approaching the treasury with his bodyguards, the Lord of spirits… (struck). There appeared to them a richly caparisoned horse, mounted by a dreadful rider. Charging furiously the horse attacked Heliodorus with his front hoofs…Then two other young men, remarkably strong…beautiful…splendidly attired, appeared…they flogged (Heliodorus) unceasingly…Suddenly, he fell to the ground enveloped in a great darkness…The man who a moment ago had entered that treasury with a great retinue and his whole bodyguard was carried away helpless…” (2 Maccabees, Chapter 3:14-28)

Raphael followed the biblical text closely. He depicts the three major parties in the religious story: the divine rider, two youths and Heliodorus; the figure of the anguished priest; and the “girded” women.  As he does in The Deliverance of Saint Peter, the Pope identifies with one of the major priestly characters in the art work if one detects, as some scholars do, the features of Julius II in the High Priest Onias III.⁸ The Stanza D’Eliodoro and its first fresco The Explusion of Heliodorus is a milestone for its scale, its composition, its form, its treatment of subject, its color, its narrative power, and its graceful draughtmanship.

The fresco depicts a 13th century miracle connected to the Eucharist when a traveling priest, doubting the Real Presence of Jesus in the consecrated host, is given proof of its reality when the altar cloth he uses for Mass becomes stained with blood from the Host. The cloth relic was revered by Julius II and housed in Orvieto Cathedral where it is today. From its inception, the five handsome youths in the bottom right section of the fresco have been admired for their sturdy monumentality perhaps influenced by Michelangelo as well as its colors and costumes showing Venetian influence. (Beck, pp. 100-101).

Giuliano della Rovere (1443-1513) was described by Machiavelli in his works as an ideal prince. Becoming pope in 1503, he took the name Julius II in honor of Julius Caesar and was nicknamed the Warrior Pope. In 1506 Julius II organized the famous Swiss Guard for his personal protection and established the Vatican Museums. He was also the pope who instigated the rebuilding of St. Peter’s Basilica that exists today. The pope increased the power of the Papal States and, in 1508, he commissioned the Raphael Rooms and Michelangelo’s paintings in the Sistine Chapel. It was Julius II who also established the first bishoprics in the New World. Although the Tomb of Pope Julius II with its famous sculpture of Moses by Michelangelo is in San Pietro in Vincoli in Rome, the ensemble, extensively abbreviated than originally planned, was not finished until 1545, long after Julius II’s death in 1520. In fact, Julius II is buried in St. Peter’s Basilica.

San Pietro in Vincoli in Rome (“St. Peter in Chains”) was Julius II’s titular church when he was a cardinal before becoming pope. It was also his uncle’s church before him, pope Sixtus IV (1471-1484). When pope, Julius II made pilgrimage to the church in 1512 after the French evacuated from Italy. The liberation in the title of Raphael’s concurrent fresco probably refers to that of the Papal States with St. Peter taking on the physical characteristics of Julius II. The fresco was being painted during the year when the pope was dying which took place in February 1513. Raphael’s use of light in this fresco is probably the boldest in art taking place at night in the whole of Renaissance art. (Beck, pp. 102-3).

Raphael’s painting was made for the high altar of a newly rebuilt church of Pope St. Sixtus (d. 257) in Piacenza, Italy. St. Sixtus kneels on a cloud before the Virgin and Christ Child with a hand over his heart. The saint is interceding for the worshippers of Piacenza to whom he gestures outward with his other hand. Opposite is St. Barbara, patron of soldiers, with the symbol of a tower behind her. (Roger & Penny p. 128)

The painting also includes Sts. Paul, John the Evangelist, Augustine and Mary Magdalene. It was an altarpiece for a chapel in S. Giovanni in Monte in Bologna founded by Elena Duglioli dall’ Olio (1472-1520). The Italian aristocrat wanted to become a Poor Clare nun but was forced to marry by her family. She persuaded her husband, however, not to consummate the marrage attributed to her devotion to St. John (patron of virginity) and St. Cecilia and of which Raphael was commissioned to execute the altarpiece. Elena’s benefactor in this enterprise of her religious vocation was the influential Cardinal Alidosi. Raphael depicts St. Cecilia with an organetto slipping from her hands as she looks skyward to the preferred sound of heavenly music. Elena died on September 23, 1520 and her remains are incorrupt in her church of San Giovanni in Monte. In 1828 she was beatified by Pope Leo XII (1760-1829). Her feast day is September 23. (Roger & Penny, pp. 144-146).

On St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430):

The phrase “When in Rome, do as the Romans do” is credited to St. Ambrose, bishop of Milan, from the 4th century. Their bishop said it to Saint Monica and her son, St. Augustine, on their visit to Rome after they discovered that Saturday was a seasonal “Ember” day of abstinence and prayer which was not the practice in Milan. Saint Ambrose’s answer was to be adaptable, thus: “When in Rome,…” After St. Augustine (354-430) and his successor Boethius (c. 470-c. 525) Europe entered the Dark Ages. There was no really important thinker until the 11th century. Even in 2025 It is said that after St. Paul, there is no greater legacy of Christian thought than that of St. Augustine of Hippo. Augustine died a new man on August 28, 430, a bishop by then himself, as he witnessed his city of Hippo succumb to hordes of invading Vandals as Rome fell. It was all over by the 7th century as the cities were a wasteland and any learning moved to monasteries. One leading aspect of learning was theology and philosophy – grappling with the problems of God’s existence and who He is in relation to man. Before Christianity, Augustine tried Manicheism that explained the world in purely rational and material terms. Finding it unsatisfactory he turned to Skepticism – an old idea in popular practice in the 21st century – which distrusted or denied objective truth for subjective conviction. Finally, Neoplatonism, which had a spiritual bent but, unlike Christianity, had no Supreme Creator and saw the material world as a block to spirituality’s end. Christianity had its philosophical problems also for Augustine and others: while creation was a matter of God’s will for his creature of actual being, where and how did God and man meet? Philosophically, this relationship of Creator and creature remained the central issue for Augustine before and after his becoming a Christian at 32 years old. His battles with the Berber schism of Donatists (who denied the objective value of the sacraments) and Pelagianism (Pelagius being an Irishman who denied original sin and man’s need for grace) led to Augustine’s Doctrine of Creation and Doctrine of Grace for which he is well-known. While fallen man is limited and cannot know God, the desire to know God is itself a sign of grace on a natural level. Augustine asserts one can know God only by faith and, though he offers no formal proof for the existence of God, Augustine reasoned that before one desires or seeks to know anything one must have some idea or believes in its existence. In his battle with Pelagius Augustine determined man needed grace from the beginning – even in the Garden of Eden before the fall. Grace is what led Adam and Eve to God. After the Fall (The LORD God then called to the man and asked him: Where are you? [Adam] answered, “I heard you in the garden; but I was afraid, because I was naked, so I hid.” Genesis 3: 9-10), grace is what heals man. Without grace man’s fallen nature cannot allow his free will to overcome his limitations. Grace is a way to freedom for man to give effect to his desires for good. From here Augustinianism moved beyond these things to self-knowledge and Universals; the Nature of God and the Trinity; Sin; and political philosophy (“City of God”), among other topics. One important characteristic of Augustine as bishop was his living a common “monastic” life with his clergy. Augustine believed strongly in the formation of religious communities for spiritual witness and support and material well-being among Christians.

Augustine was born in Algeria in North Africa. He was likely a Berber and grew up in a family where his mother, Monica, was a Christian and his father, Patricius, was a pagan. His father died in 371 after becoming a Christian and Monica did not remarry. St. Monica prayed for her pagan son to become a Christian and is the human being considered most responsible for that result. Augustine who loved the Latin-language Roman poet Virgil (he was less fond of Greek) followed a normal course of study for students at the time and was trained in rhetoric at Carthage. He lived with a woman for a time and had a son by her named Adeodatus with whom he had a lifelong fatherly relationship. Augustine in these early years was a Manichaean, a former major world religion that disappeared in Europe by the 6th century. To explain evil the Manicheans taught a dualistic cosmology where the spiritual world was good and the material world, uncreated by their concept of God, was bad. These beliefs made life in the world a prison to be escaped from by asceticism and intellectuality. It was directly contrary to Christianity which believed God, who created the material world, became flesh and blood man in Jesus Christ. The Manicheans rejected the Bible and taught that Christ could only be a spiritual being and not human. By the time Augustine traveled to Rome and then to Milan to teach rhetoric in 384, he gave up Manicheanism and entered a difficult period of searching. In Milan he met its great bishop St. Ambrose whose sermons showed him the unity of faith and reason in Christian teaching and an escape from skepticism as well as categorically rigid spiritualism and materialism. Augustine was baptized by St. Ambrose at 32 years old at the Easter Vigil, on April 24, 387 in Milan where he was joined by his son Adeodatus and his lifelong friend (and later bishop) Alypius of Thagaste who were also baptized. Though Augustine’s conversion was delayed when it occurred it was complete and complex insofar as integrating his many background experiences with Christianity. Augustine left teaching and went to Cassiciacum near Milan to become a writer. Adeodatus died prematurely in 390, and when Augustine returned to Africa, he was persuaded by Bishop Valerius of Hippo to become a priest. In 395 Augustine became auxiliary bishop to Valerius and soon succeeded him as bishop of Hippo. Augustine spent the next 35 years as a diocesan bishop and prolific and influential writer. He died in 430 in trying times: the Vandals had begun the destruction of the Roman Empire and invaded Africa in 429 including the sacking of Hippo. Taking it forward almost 1600 years, when Chicago-born Robert Prevost was elected as Pope Leo XIV in 2025, in addition to being a White Sox fan, he is an Augustinian friar, priest, bishop, and cardinal who takes inspiration from St. Augustine of Hippo, Leo XIV is the first Augustinian pope since Pope Eugene IV elected in 1431. see- https://dacb.org/stories/tunisia/adeodatus/ – retrieved August 28, 2025. The Saints: A Concise Biographical Dictionary, edited by John Coulson, Guild Press, New York, 1957. Medieval Thought, Gordon Leff, Humanities Press, Highland, New Jersey, 1958.

The name of the room comes from this fresco which Raphael began work on in the summer of 1514. It depicts a newly imagined historical event from the mid-9^th century when a fire broke out in Rome. The pope (Leo IV) is seen giving a blessing from the balcony of Old St. Peter’s which, the story goes, tamped down the flames. In the meantime Raphael depicted the event’s panic and drama among its foreground figures in its throes. Once more Raphael is re-inventing his art from only a couple of years earlier. As Raphael continued the practice of borrow ing certain figures and themes from previous frescos, the overall classical style of the Segnatura and Eliodoro frescos are remarkably more spatially complex and intriguing in The Fire in the Borgo. Raphael absorbed what Rome offered – from Michelangelo’s latest art to architecture, both contemporary and ancient, in the city. The Ionic columns of Old St. Peter’s are accurately rendered as are the building fragment of Corinthian columns. (Beck, p. 110).

The Raphael Cartoons are designs for tapestries and were commissioned from Raphael by Pope Leo X (1513-21) shortly after his election in 1513. The tapestries were intended to hang in the Sistine Chapel in Rome, built by Pope Sixtus IV (1471-84). The decoration of the chapel under Sixtus addressed the lives of Moses and Christ. The tapestries continued this theme, illustrating scenes from the lives of St. Peter and St. Paul.

In La Donna Velata and Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione, Raphael, the master portraitist, present near ideal depictions. Both portraits are of almost identical dimensions. The model Raphael used for La Donna Velata he used in other artworks of this period, including The Sistine Madonna. These mid 1510s’ portraits have progressively become gentler in their modeling than a tight, detailed study of corporeal features done before. Raphael begins a display of a mastery of forms and colors that had great influence on future artists such as Rubens and Rembrandt. However, Raphael’s painting does not forgo his mastery of draughtmanship exampled in the female sitter’s sleeve or the overall nobility of the male sitter. (Beck, pp. 108-09; 116-17).

Jacopo Basilio commissioned this painting for the Monastery of Santa Maria dello Spasimo in Palermo, Sicily, from which it derives its popular name, lo Spasimo di Sicilia (“The Wonder of Sicily”). The painting reflects Raphael´s interest in the depiction of extreme physical and psychological states. https://www.museodelprado.es/en/the-collection/art-work/christ-falls-on-the-way-to-calvary/870c8293-1691-4a90-88ff-b554a2bc3fe8?searchid=d42d76c7-eb9f-501b-f628-d03605a6ca9c – retrieved September 4, 2024.

This was an important group portrait commission for Raphael: the current Pope Leo X Medici (1513-1521) seated by his cousins, Cardinals Giulio de’ Medici on the left and Luigi de’ Rossi on the right. Giulio de’ Medici was soon to become the future pope Clement VII (1523-1534). Though highly individualized, Raphael captures a family resemblance between these three Medici – then the most powerful family in Italy – who are all about the same age. In 1517 Cardinal Giulio was an important art patron and already commissioned Raphael to do The Transfiguration, his last painting. Raphael demonstrates a wide range of artistic experience and skills so that he pulls from his tool-box whatever is required for a successful outcome of any commission. In Urbino Raphael had been exposed to Flemish art and deploys its detailed technique in the bell and manuscript which 42-year-old Leo X uses a magnifier to see. The setting of the monumental portrait, in a room in the Vatican, is subtly captured by way of Flemish art ingenuity. The doorknob in front of newly-made cardinal Luigi de’ Rossi shows the reflection of an open window while the cape and biretta of the pope are highly detailed by the artist in its natural light. The Portrait of Leo X and Two Cardinals is considered the greatest group portrait of the 16th century. (Beck, pp. 120-121)

This painting was commissioned by Giovanni Branconio, the Apostolic Protonotary, at the behest of his father, Marino Branconio, for the family chapel at the church of San Silvestre de Aquila. Marino´s choice of subject matter was undoubtedly guided by the fact that his wife was named Elizabeth and his son, John. In 1655, this work was acquired by Felipe IV (1605-1665), who deposited it at El Escorial. It entered the Prado Museum in 1837.

FOOTNOTES:

1. Giorgio Vasari, Lives of the Artists, translated by George Bull (Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England, 1965) pages 316-18.

2. Ibid., page 318 and Edizioni Musei Vaticani, Michelangelo and Raphael in the Vatican, (Tipografia Vaticana, Città del Vaticano, 1995) page 169.

3. Vasari, Lives, pages 285 and 291.

4. Ibid., pages 299-302.

5. Roger Jones and Nicholas Penny, Raphael, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1983, page 113 and 17. Carlo Ludivico, Vatican Museums Rome, page 119

6. Roger Jones and Nicholas Penny, Raphael, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1983, page 117 and Vasari, Lives, page 301.

7. Frederick Hartt, History of Italian Renaissance Art: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, Harry N. Abrams, Inc. New York, Third Edition, 1987, page 513.

8. New American Bible, (Catholic Book Publishing Company, New York) page 546 and 550; Beck, Raphael, page 98.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

Brera Milan Great Museums of the World, Carlo Ludovico Ragghianti, Newsweek NY 1970 pp. 34

Pinakothek Munich Great Museums of the World, Roberto Salvini, et. al., Newsweek NY 1969 pp. 126

Lives of the Artists, Giorgio Vasari, translated by George Bull, Penguin Books, Harmondsworth, Middlesex, England, 1965, pages 316-18

Michelangelo and Raphael in the Vatican, Edizioni Musei Vaticani, Tipografia Vaticana, Città del Vaticano, 1995 p. 169

Raffaello. Franzese, Paolo (2008). Milano: Mondadori Arte. 

Raphael, James H. Beck, harry N. Abrams, Inc., Publishers, New York, 1994.

Raphael, Roger Jones and Nicholas Penny, Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1983.

Encyclopedia of the Middle Ages, Volume 2, André Vauchez, Richard Barrie Dobson, Michael Lapidge, Chicago: Fitzroy, Dearborn, 2000.

History of Italian Renaissance Art: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture, Frederick Hartt, Harry N. Abrams, Inc. New York, Third Edition, 1987.

Raphael, Beck, James H., Harry N. Abrams, Inc. Publishers, New York, 1994.

The Medici Popes (Leo X and Clement VII), Herbert M. Vaughan, B.A., Methuen & Co., London, 1908.

“Alidosi, Francesco, detto il Cardinal di Pavia”. Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani – Volume 2. Treccani. 1960.

This explanatory article may be periodically updated.