papal statesconcept:movement high renaissance

The School of Athens

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Fresco by Raphael, 1509-1511. Stanza della Segnatura, Vatican. Depicts the great philosophers of antiquity gathered in a grand classical hall, with Plato and Aristotle at the centre. Commissioned by Pope Julius II.

Notes

·Part of the fresco cycle for the Stanza della Segnatura (the private library of Pope Julius II), which also includes the Disputa (theology) and Parnassus (poetry).
·Plato points upward (toward ideal forms) while Aristotle gestures downward (toward empirical reality) — encoding the distinction between idealism and empiricism.
·Raphael included portraits of contemporaries in the guise of ancient philosophers: Leonardo da Vinci as Plato, Michelangelo (added late) as Heraclitus, and Raphael himself in the lower right corner.
·The architectural setting was probably designed by Donato Bramante (Raphael's relative by marriage) and loosely resembles the new St. Peter's Basilica then under construction.
·The fresco is a visual manifesto of Renaissance humanism: the synthesis of pagan philosophy and Christian scholarship.