Backgrounds in Madonna paintings by Raphael
Listen to Dr. Linda Wolk-Simon, the director of the Bellarmine Museum and Thomas J wall art gallery at Fairfield University in Fairfield, Connecticut, explores backgrounds in Raphael's Madonna paintings.
Dr. Linda Wolk-Simon discusses six of Raphael's Madonna paintings in this video.
The 'Small Cowper Madonna' was painted in the middle of the High Renaissance, around 1504–1505. It depicts Mary and the Child in the typical Italian countryside. The painting is one of the greatest Renaissance paintings in America.
The 'Madonna of the Pinks' is an oil on fruitwood painting, dating around 1506 – 1507. The painting depicts a youthful Mary handing Christ child carnations. These flowers in Greek mean 'flower of God’, and are a premonition of Christ's Passion. According to Christian legend, the carnation flower first appeared when Virgin Mary wept at the Crucifixion.
The 'Garvagh Madonna' was dated to around 1509–1510. The painting depicts Virgin Mary, the Christ Child, and the infant John the Baptist.
In this painting the Christ Child takes a carnation from his cousin John the Baptist's hand, symbolizing accepting sacrifices. Meanwhile, Mary seems lost in her thoughts. She might think of the children's destinies.
The 'Madonna of the Meadow' was created in 1506. In the painting, Raphael painted Mary in a gold-bordered blue mantle and a red dress. The blue symbolizes the church, and the red symbolizes Christ's death.
The 'Holy Family with a Lamb' is an oil-on-panel painting dating to around 1507. The painting is based on a preparatory drawing by Leonardo da Vinci for the main altar at the church of La Annunciata in Florence. But Raphael modified the scene's implications by depicting Mary helping Christ Child embrace the lamb. Meanwhile, Saint Joseph looks at Christ Child with an attentive, meditative expression.
The 'Sistine Madonna' or the 'Madonna di San Sisto' was painted in 1512 by Pope Julius II's order. The painting is one of the last Madonnas painted by Raphael.
Hans Belting and Helen Atkins describe the influence the painting has had in Germany, "Like no other work of art, Raphael's Sistine Madonna in Dresden has fired the Germans' imagination, uniting or dividing them in the debate about art and religion.... Over and again, this painting has been hailed as 'supreme among the world's paintings' and accorded the epithet ‘divine '..."