IN SEARCH OF RAPHAEL

VATICAN MUSEUMS

Viale Vaticano http://m.museivaticani.va

After three years as pope, Julius II (pontiff 1503-13) decided to move out of the papal apartments in the Vatican, which were decorated to the taste of his predecessor, Pope Alexander VI Borgia (pontiff 1492-1503), and move to the floor above, to a new private apartment. The structural presentation and interior decoration of the rooms was overseen by the papal architect, Donato Bramante. Talented painters, including Raphael, were commissioned. Raphael was to decorate rooms known today as the Stanze Vaticane. For Raphael the result was sensational: Stanza della Segnatura (1508-11) the first to be decorated, embraced Greece’s and Rome’s ancient, pagan past, embodied in portrayals of Plato and Aristotle in the School of Athens. Raphael included depictions of Leonardo da Vinci (as Plato) and Michelangelo (as Heraclitus), Bramante (as Euclid), and himself as an and . Stanza dell’Incendio di Borgo (1514-17) followed, and Sala di Costantino, decorated to his design by Raphael’s workshop after his death in 1520. Raphael also designed the Vatican’s fabulous Logge (1517-18).