Although he lived but thirty-seven years, Raphael gave to the world a vast amount of art treasure. Brought up in Urbino, where his father, Giovanni Santi, was poet as well as painter, he passed before he was fifteen under the direct influence of Timoteo Viti, who had worked at Bologna under Francesco Francia. Raphael became the pupil of Perugino at Perugia about 1500, and also worked as the assistant of Pintoricchio. His art being thus formed on the best Umbrian tradition, Raphael in October 1504 left Perugia for Florence, and it was only at that date that he began to acquire a distinctive style of his own. During his second or Florentine period he painted the St. George and the Dragon (No. 1503), in which is seen the chivalrous knight mounted on a pure white steed; his lance is broken in his combat with the monster, and he is forced to use his sword, while the little Princess Cleodolinda flees in abject terror into the background. The very small panel of St. Michael (No. 1502), which is a chessboard on the back, was painted for Guidobaldo, Duke of Urbino, and eventually passed into the collections of Cardinal Mazarin and Louis xiv. The Madonna and Child which has come to be known as La Belle Jardinière (No. 1496, [Plate VII.]) is rather later than the Madonna del Gran’ Duca in the Pitti Palace, the Cardellino Madonna in the Uffizi, and the Ansidei Madonna in the National Gallery. It is one of the most famous of Raphael’s saintly and ideal Madonnas; the pose of the figures is easy, the treatment simple, the colour exquisite. The landscape background is poetic in feeling, and conveys the mood which makes this one of Raphael’s most pleasing creations. The thin feathery trees and the treatment of the Virgin’s hair are still Peruginesque, but the superiority of the pupil to the master is gradually making itself felt. The Infant Christ is standing on the right foot of His mother. Tradition says that Raphael entrusted to Ridolfo Ghirlandaio the task of painting in the blue of the Virgin’s garment. The drapery is apparently inscribed:
VRB. RAPHAELLO MDVII.
After working for four years in Florence, Raphael went in the summer of 1508 to Rome, where he achieved such a vast amount of work for Popes Julius ii. and Leo x. His work was increased by his appointment, on the death of Bramante in 1514, as Architect of St. Peter’s and Inspector of Antiquities.
About 1515–16 Raphael delighted to paint the Portrait of Baldassare Castiglione (No. 1505, [Plate VIII.]), who was his lifelong friend and adviser as well as the author of Il Cortegiano. This picture, which is eloquent testimony to Raphael’s skill as a portrait painter, was originally on wood, but it was long ago transferred to canvas, which has unfortunately abraded, the paint having peeled off the hands. After the death of Castiglione in Spain, this picture which he had taken with him passed into the possession of the Duke of Mantua, and thence into the collection of Charles i., where it seems to have been copied by Rubens. It subsequently became the property of a Dutch amateur named Van Asselen, and was copied by Rembrandt. Later, it was sold for 3500 florins to Don Alfonso Lopez, a collector at Amsterdam, and after figuring in the collection of Mazarin was acquired by Louis xiv.
The Holy Family of Francis I. (No. 1498) was commissioned by Lorenzo de’ Medici and presented to the Queen of François i. by Pope Leo x. It was originally painted on wood, and was forwarded to Lyons on April 19, 1518. During the reign of Louis xiv. it hung in the grand appartement at Versailles, and having been placed near a fireplace had to be relined. It then had wings, but they were destroyed at the time of the Revolution. Although it is very ostentatiously signed
RAPHAEL VRBINAS PINGEBAT MDXVIII
on the edge of the robe of the kneeling Madonna, there can be no question that it was only designed by Raphael, the execution being wholly or in great part carried out by the master’s best pupil, Giulio Romano. In the Sistine Madonna and such works as Raphael painted at this period entirely with his own hand we see that his technique had become masterly and his powers of composition had developed to the utmost. Compared with La Belle Jardinière of a decade earlier, a greater knowledge of craftsmanship has been accompanied by a loss of purity and simplicity.
PLATE VII.—RAPHAEL
(1483–1520)
UMBRIAN SCHOOL
No. 1496.—LA BELLE JARDINIÈRE
(La Vierge dite La Belle Jardinière)
The Virgin is seated in a flowery meadow. She wears a red tunic edged with black, yellow sleeves and a blue mantle; a book is on her knees; her fair hair is confined under a transparent veil. She looks down to the left at the Infant Jesus, who leans tenderly against her knee and draws her attention to the little St. John the Baptist who kneels to the right, his reed cross in his right hand. The background shows a landscape containing a small town with its church, and a lake surrounded by mountains.