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Photograph of Raphael's "Poetry" on the Ceiling of the Stanza della Segnatura Anonymous Italian
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Curator’s description:
Description
The figures are placed in a roundel, set against a background painted to imitate mosaic. Poetry sits in the centre, holding a closed book and a stylised lyre, and wearing a poet's laurel wreath in her hair. The bank of clouds on which she sits also support a putto to either side of her, each holding a plaque which carries an inscription.
As noted by Cook and Wedderburn, the photograph reproduces part of Raphael's ceiling decorations in the Stanza della Segnatura in the Vatican Palace, decorated for Pope Julius II from 1508 to 1511. Poetry was one of four roundels, each depicted above the centre of one of the walls of the room, the others containing Theology, Justice and Philosophy. The wall below Poetry was decorated with a scene on Parnassus.
The photograph was first catalogued in the "Catalogue of Examples" of 1870, when Ruskin listed it as no. 18 in the Standard Series (between a photograph of "Justice" from the same ceiling, and an engraving of "Parnassus", on the wall below "Poetry" in the Stanza). It retained its position in the 1872 catalogue of the series.
Ruskin simply drew attention to the grandeur of the depiction of light and shade in the picture.
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Details
- Artist/maker
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Anonymous Italian (Anonymous, Italian) (photographer)after Raphael (1483 - 1520)
- Object type
- photograph
- Material and technique
- albumen print
- Dimensions
- 646 x 503 mm
- Associated place
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- Europe › Italy › Lazio › Roma (Rome) › Rome › Vatican Palace › Vatican Palace (Stanza della Segnatura, subject)
- Inscription
- On the painting, and so part of the photograph, on the panels held by the putti:
on the left: NVMI|NE
on the right: AFFLA|TVR
Verso:
bottom left, in graphite: No2
centre, in graphite: NB. offset [?] on | backing card.
centre right, in graphite: 19
bottom centre, the Ruskin School's stamp
- Provenance
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Presented by John Ruskin to the Ruskin Drawing School (University of Oxford), 1875; transferred from the Ruskin Drawing School to the Ashmolean Museum, c.1949.
- No. of items
- 1
- Accession no.
- WA.RS.STD.019
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Subject terms allocated by curators:
Subjects
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References in which this object is cited include:
References
Ruskin, John, Catalogue of Examples Arranged for Elementary Study in the University Galleries (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1870), cat. Standard no. 19
Ruskin, John, Catalogue of the Reference Series Including Temporarily the First Section of the Standard Series (London: Smith, Elder, [1872]), cat. Standard no. 19
Ruskin, John, ‘The Ruskin Art Collection at Oxford: Catalogues, Notes and Instructions’, Edward T. Cook and Alexander Wedderburn, eds, The Works of John Ruskin: Library Edition, 39 (London: George Allen, 1903-1912), 21, cat. Standard no. 19
Location
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- Western Art Print Room
Position in Ruskin’s Collection
Ruskin's Catalogues
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Ruskin's Catalogue of Examples (1870)
19. Poetry. (Raphael.) Photograph from the Vatican fresco.The light and shade, at least so far as the photograph may be trusted, is grander in this design than in the Justice; and it must always be remembered that the breadth of its treatment by great masters is necessarily lost in line engravings, for which loss, nearly total, we must allow in the next example.
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Ruskin's Standard & Reference series (1872)
19. Poetry. (Raphael.) Photograph from the Vatican fresco.The light and shade, at least so far as the photograph may be trusted, is grander in this design than in the Justice; and it must always be remembered that the breadth of its treatment by great masters is necessarily lost in line engravings, for which loss, nearly total, we must allow in the next example.
