by Ricardo Dominguez

The school of Athens 

Great artist called Raphael Sanzio made the amazing work called “The school of Athens”.  Raphael started painting good pieces mainly inspired in Leonardo da Vinci’s work, but in 1508 Pope Julius II, called Raphael to start working in the mosaics of the Vatican in Rome, one interesting thing about these works he made in the Vatican is that in the rooms he painted there where already works made by Piero Della Francesca, Luca Signorelli, and Perugino but the pope Julius said that they needed new artistic decorations.

The school of Athens is know days considered as the perfect example for the spirit of the high renascence and it was the masterpiece of Raphael this work is in one room of the Vatican it was painted between 1509 to 1510 and his final dimensions where 500 cm × 770 cm (200 in × 300 in), it was painted in fresco style that consist in a mural done with watercolors on wet plaster. 

The mural covers many aspects like The figures exemplify Philosophy, Poetry, Law and Theology, it also symbolizes the idealism compared with the realism where you can see the difference of this concept they had by those times. For the philosophy the mural represents all the known philosophers of that time like these characteristics the painting has many other representations or interpretations.

Works Cited

"Raphael Biography." Italian Renaissance Art. nd. Web. 29 Sept. 2010. <http://www.italian-renaissance-art.com/Raphael-Biography.html>.

"Raphael's School of Athens." Patrons of the Arts in the Vatican Musuems. nd. Web. 29 Sept. 2010. <http://www.vatican-patrons.org/raphael.htm>.

"'The School of Athens' by Raphael." Art and History. nd. Web. 29 Sept. 2010. <http://www.arthistoryguide.com/The_School_of_Athens.aspx>.