Raphael’s School of Athens: The Medium and the Message

Top 10 Learning Moments

1. The great quality we see in Renaissance art is partly due to the systematic exploitation of child labor. — Ingrid Rowland
2. He’s lucky to be in the company of two of the greatest explainers of his era- one of them is named Egidio da Viterbo[…] he was famous as a preacher and what he did was try to bring the ideas of Plato into play with normal people. He’s probably in situations where he can talk to Raphael one-on-one. So some of what Raphael is getting is from this man who was really the most influential theologian of his day and the most popular preacher. — Ingrid Rowland
3. The other man who is in constant contact with Raphael while he’s painting the School of Athens is Tommaso Inghirami, who is the greatest actor of Renaissance Rome. … So Raphael could ask him about things and he’s not just going to get some boring disquisition. — Ingrid Rowland
4. I think that’s where he’s getting a lot of his information from, these two spectacularly dramatic performers. — Ingrid Rowland
5. The School of Athens isn’t filled with blank slates of figures, they’re really people. so he has their same ability to bring things to life. — Ingrid Rowland
6. Florence is an absolutely crucial stop in Raphael’s development and in the development of the whole artistic sensibility. — Ingrid Rowland
7. I think one of the reasons people thought he was so charming was that he was a good listener. You never really hear about what he was like, you hear that he was gentle and charming and with the giant egos of the Renaissance I suspect that meant that he just sat quietly and just took it all in and processed it. — Ingrid Rowland
8. What there was between Michelangelo and Raphael was competition. and Raphael being the younger one, probably thinks he has more to learn. — Ingrid Rowland
9. I think Raphael has this way of conveying peace and belonging that is universal. — Ingrid Rowland
10. Painting is a silent medium. Whatever it can express, it has to express in silence. The challenge for the artist is whether you represent things happening or human interactions that involve speaking and listening. So as much as there is talking going on in the School of Athens, it means that more than half are listening. It puts the viewer of the painting as “listeners.” When he’s painting someone who is listening, he is painting you, the viewer, in that place. — David Mayernick