In some ways Raphael is the most typical master of the Renaissance. Without the turbulent personality of Michelangelo, he represents the most serene and self-confident aspect of that brief age of glory. In his short life of thirty seven years, he summed up the assurance of the era as well as its many worldly, artistic, and intellectual accomplishments.

From a material point of view, Raphael's life was a continuous series of triumphs, mounting from one success to another. After a modest provincial background at Urbino he went to the art center of Florence and ended in the greatest cosmopolitan Rome of the Renaissance Popes. Artistically, his development repeats the evolution of Italian art up to his own time. From an early cramped sentimentalism his work moves to a more monumental Florentine style, and finally to the serene classical assurance of the Roman works. Intellectually, he reflects the urge of his time toward a compromise between the classical past and the Christian present.

The conventional and typical side of Raphael's art may be seen in the many charming Madonnas which present his own brand of sentiment as well as the characteristic preferences of the period as a whole. These works have remained popular for more than four hundred years. The familiar The Alba Madonna, is a tondo or round picture, in which the three figures are neatly arranged in a parallelogram within the circle of the frame. One straight line may be traced along the Madonna's leg and the arm holding the book; on the other side a parallel line moves from Her left shoulder to the hip of little St. John the Baptist. The short sides of this typical geometric enclosure are formed by the left upper arm and by the line from the tip of Her extended foot to the hip of St. John. The body of the Christ Child forms as second parallelogram placed at an angle to the first.

In contrast to this strict symmetry, the three faces express a yearning sentimentality, probably intended to give a mystical feeling to the picture, much favored in certain circles for its clear religious character. The scene of unworldliness, heightened by the isolated and almost empty landscape, is a prominent feature of the Neo-Platonic idealism of the period. Some of the elements are reminiscent of Michelangelo (the hand holding the book) or Leonardo (the forms and faces of the children), but the synthesis is Raphael's own. This is illustrated again in his sentimental St. George and the Dragon which is arranged in an “X” shape that moves into the four corners of the picture.

The literary and intellectual side of the Renaissance, its fusion of classical and Christian elements, may be seen in the series of frescoes executed for Pope Julius II in the papal apartments of the Vatican. Here, all the knowledge of the day, pagan and Christian, has been brought together. The School of Athens, one of the best known sections of these splendid decorations, shows the philosophers, scientists, and poets of the ancient Greek world moving through the nave of a cathedral very much like St. Peter's (then in process of rebuilding). The painting on the wall opposite is a summary of Christian theology.

In The School of Athens various persons are arranged in a rectangle that occupies the lower half of the wall. A series of receding areas carries the spectator in and up to the lofty vaults that move into the distance, giving the scene an effect of profound depth. In the exact center are Plato and Aristotle, the two philosophers who represent the ideal and the practical sides of life. Plato, who resembles the elderly Leonardo da Vinci, points upward in a spiritual gesture; Aristotle holds his hand straight out with the palm facing down toward the earth. Similarly the figures at the left represent philosophical learning (like the gesticulating Socrates on the top step) while those on the right represent more practical learning (like Euclid in the lower corner demonstrating a theorem) .

The frescoes in this series are notable not only because Raphael has brought together a tremendous body of knowledge, but also because the arrangement of forms is balanced and controlled in such a seemingly easy and comfortable way. In The School of Athens, the eye is directed to the central figures and the deep space beyond them with absolute inevitability. The floor lines and the figures on them (including the skeptical Diogenes sprawling on the stairs) lead to the steps; the eye is carried to the next important level by Diogenes and the man walking up near him. At the top of the steps there is a short halt. The figures here are arranged in a straight line, as though in relief sculpture; the eye moves out to the corners and then in again to the central figures under their arch. The next move is up into the vaults, each one constituting a point of rest with the alternating empty spaces. Each set of vault lines moves closer together until they ultimately converge at a point between the two main philosophers. Thus, the many figures and the spacious architecture inevitably return to the central point of the painter's argument where the elderly Plato holds his book of Ethics and the young vigorous Aristotle carries his Politics, the two perfect symbols of the theoretical and practical approaches.

The latter part of Raphael's short life was filled with a variety of work. He was directing architect of St. Peter's and other building projects; he was in charge of archaeological excavations in the entire Roman area; and he supervised, less and less closely, the many commissions which poured into his studio. One of the most poplar figures of his period, he was widely courted both as both an artist and as a man. Untroubled, he fulfilled countless social obligations, proved endlessly fascinating to the ladies, and somehow managed to maintain control of his many projects. Eventually the pace began to tell on both his health and his work; but to his countrymen he remained “the lucky boy." He died on Good Friday of 1520 and and was buried in the ancient Roman Pantheon which had be converted into a church.