Raphael (Raffaello Sanzio)

b. 1483 and died 1520

Raphael Sanzio, usually known by his first name alone, in Italian Raffaello, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance celebrated for the perfection and grace of his paintings and drawings. Together with Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci, he forms the traditional trinity of great masters of that period.

Raphael was enormously productive because he ran an unusually large workshop during his lifetime. Despite his early death at thirty-seven, a large body of his work remains, especially in the Vatican, whose frescoed “Raphael Rooms” are the central and largest works of his career, although they were left unfinished at his death.

After his early years in Rome, much of Raphael’s work was designed by him, but executed largely by the workshop from his drawings, thereby resulting in a considerable loss of quality. He was extremely influential in his lifetime, though outside Rome he was mostly known for his collaborative printmaking. After his death, the influence of his great rival Michelangelo was more widespread until the 18th and 19th centuries, when Raphael's more serene and harmonious qualities were again regarded as the highest models.

His career falls naturally into three phases and three styles, first described by Giorgio Vasari: his early years in Umbria, then a period of about four years (from 1504-1508) absorbing the artistic traditions of Florence, and finally followed by his last hectic and triumphant twelve years in Rome, working for two Popes and their close associates.