PJ's Studio: June 2026

Sunday, June 28, 2026

School of Athens

As I mentioned in a previous blog, I believe that “School of Athens” in the Vatican City is Raphael’s finest work. He painted it in 1509-1511. It is part of the Stanze di Raffaello in the Apostolic Palace.

Most of the attention paid to the work focuses on the figures represented – said to be every great Greek philosopher, although not all have been identified. Hence a guessing game that has lasted for centuries.

The key figures are Plato on the left – holding his book “Timaeus” and Aristotle on the right holding his book “Ethics.” As was the fashion of the day, real people were used to represent historic figures – Plato is based on Leonardo da Vinci.

We can recognize Pythagoras by his harmonic scale. Telauges is on his right. But we don’t know if that’s Anaximander or Boethius on his left.

Raphael included himself – in the black hat second from the right facing us, mixing with Ptolemy whose back is to us and either Zoroaster or Seleucus on his left.

The lone woman included in the painting is Hypatia of Alexandria who was a renowned Neoplatonist philosopher, astronomer and mathematician in 4^th century Egypt.

Socrates (on the right) praised her as a brilliant philosopher and condemned her tragic murder during Lent 415 CE by a Christian mob who dragged her into a church, stripped her and brutally murdered her.

Perhaps my favorite story about the mural is that Raphael was painting it at the same time that Michelangelo was painting the Sistine Chapel. After sneaking a peak at his work, Raphael was so impressed by what he saw, that he decided to add Michelangelo to the painting.

While it’s fun to play “guess who,” what makes this painting so extraordinary is its flawless one-point linear perspective. While other Renaissance artists were also making strides in their use of a single vanishing point, most of their paintings tend to just have a background and a foreground.

But Raphael creates multiple middle layers too giving the piece an incredible sense of depth. If you stand in front of the painting as I was when I took this photo, you feel like you can just walk right into it. That’s how realistic the sense of three-dimensional space is.

Definitely worth a visit – even with the crowds.

Here are some links to other Rome blogs…

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2016/01/rome.html

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2021/01/rome-3.html

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2023/11/roman-wedding.html

Cheers!

Sunday, June 21, 2026

Raphael – Sublime Poetry 2

As I mentioned in the previous blog, I was so taken with the Raphael exhibit at the Met that I went over to see it a second time.

That gave me time to really study his work.

This lovely painting was his first independent commission and may be the work that earned him the title of Magister (Master) in 1500, at the age of 17.

Apparently, his technique involved first sculpting the figures in wax. That allowed him to capture the composition.

Then he went back and worked the piece in chalk to add the depth and detail. And in this case a slight change in the head position.

I find myself wondering how he managed this. A ladder perhaps so he could look down on his model?

He took advantage of his access to the Vatican Museum, and used Laocoon

as the model for Homer (upper left) in this drawing. That’s Dante on the lower left.

Speaking of the Vatican, these two guys

appear on the lower left of The Transfiguration - albeit fully clothed.

On this visit I also realized why I had underestimated Raphael in the past. While his drawings capture his 3D subjects beautifully,

His paintings flatten out the detail and favor what I call “Crayola” colors – i.e. lots of bright primary colors that clash and do not create mood. They are however easier to distinguish from a distance, so that is no doubt why he simplified and brightened his paintings.

Note that he also changed all of the head positions in the final version as well.

Yes. I am a Raphael fangirl now. If you visit you will be too. 😉

Here are links to photos from the 2018 Grant Wood and Norman Rockwell exhibits…

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2018/06/grant-wood-whitney.html

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2018/10/grant-wood-2.html

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2018/08/norman-rockwell.html

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2018/08/norman-rockwell-2.html

Enjoy!

Sunday, June 14, 2026

Raphael – Sublime Poetry

If I had known how much I would enjoy the Met’s Raphael exhibit I would have headed over to see it sooner.

I had already seen most of the paintings that they highlighted in their publicity for the show in the various museums they had come from. (Uffizi, Borghese Gallery, Louvre)

And on our recent visit to Rome we spent a day in the Vatican Museum, primarily so I could see “The School of Athens” at my leisure. After that, I thought I pretty much had it covered.

But this show includes several studies for “The School of Athens.” – including this one. Wow!

And while I may have seen some of the paintings before, I had not seen the drawings which are so fragile that they probably aren’t displayed much even in their home museums. (Louvre, British National Gallery, Vatican)

I was simply blown away by how beautiful his drawings are.

His mastery of perspective applies to faces and hands as much as buildings. I never thought about that before.

The show does a wonderful job matching drawings -

with finished pieces when it can. (Check out that exquisite perspective.)

And when it can’t, it shows a photo from the final piece to provide context. Very cool.

As I looked at my photos to select the ones I wanted to post in this blog, I realized how much I wanted to be able to study these drawings at length, preferably without the crowds. Which gave me an idea.

So, I went over last night at 7:00p.m. when most people were heading off to their Knicks watch parties. Surprisingly, it wasn’t that much less crowded. I guess other people had the same idea. But I did get the extra time I craved.

The exhibit wraps up on June 28^th and will not be traveling.