RAFFAELLO Sanzio (b. 1483, Urbino, d. 1520, Roma) The Parnassus 1509-10 Fresco, width at base 670 cm Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican The third composition for the Stanza della Segnatura represents Parnassus, the dwelling place of Apollo and the Muses and the home of poetry, according to classical myth. Mount Parnassus, the home of Apollo, is, like the hill of the Vatican, a place where in ancient times there was a shrine to Apollo dedicated to the arts. This has a direct bearing on the picture because through the window on the wall where the fresco is painted there is a v
RAFFAELLO Sanzio (b. 1483, Urbino, d. 1520, Roma) The Parnassus 1509-10 Fresco, width at base 670 cm Stanza della Segnatura, Palazzi Pontifici, Vatican The third composition for the Stanza della Segnatura represents Parnassus, the dwelling place of Apollo and the Muses and the home of poetry, according to classical myth. Mount Parnassus, the home of Apollo, is, like the hill of the Vatican, a place where in ancient times there was a shrine to Apollo dedicated to the arts. This has a direct bearing on the picture because through the window on the wall where the fresco is painted there is a view of the Cortile del Belvedere and the hill of the Vatican. There were newly discovered classical sculptures in the Cortile, such as the Ariadne that Raphael used as a model for the muse to the left of Apollo. Apollo plays a lira da braccio (an anachronism which, according to some, was meant to symbolize the perpetual value of the poetic message). He sits under a laurel grove with the nine Muses (who personify the nine types of art). The most eminent classical and contemporary poets are depicted together in a harmonic ascending and descending movement from left to right. Homer is flanked by Virgil and Dante, Ovid and Horace are next to Sappho, while from the "ranks" of moderns we can identify Petrarch, Boccaccio and Ariosto. Petrarch is recognizable in the group in the left foreground; so is Sappho, who holds a scroll bearing her name; Ennius is seated above them, listening to the song of the blind Homer (who appears as a protagonist, like Apollo), behind him stands Dante, who had also appeared in the Disputa as a theologist, evidently because of the doctrinal content of the Divine Comedy. Some see the portrait of Michelangelo in the bearded figure immediately to the right of the central group, although it is more readily identified with Tebaldeo or Castiglione, for the scene is, after all, a celebration of poetry. Raphael in several sketches significantly changed some of t
Size: 3756px × 3000px
Photo credit: © Carlo Bollo / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: artwork, fresco, paint, painter, painting, paintings, raphael, room, rooms, vatican
