December 21, 2009

The School of Athens, one of my favorite art pieces, is a fresco done by the great Italian Renaissance painter Raphael. It was painted between 1510 and 1511 as a part of Raphael's commission to decorate the rooms now known as the Stanze di Raffaello, in the Apostolic Palace in the Vatican. While the central figures are clearly the classic Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle, many of the surrounding figures are subject to debate. The question is whether Raphael used classical or current figures in his representation.

Source