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The Reading Images Project |
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The Reading Images Project |
Style: Composition
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Composition involves the arrangement of forms in a picture. Elements might include how the picture is organized, how the main forms are placed in space and on the picture plane, the relationship of forms to each other, and the kinds of forms the artist uses. Composition both directs the viewers' attention and establishes a mood and character. Raphael's Composition |
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The composition of the School of Athens is largely determined by the painting field: semi-circular in shape, and some 19' x 27'. The lunette shape tends to create a central axis, that is, an area at the center that is tallest and thus apparently most important. The curved frame leads Raphael to use arches within the painted architecture. Figures are approximately life-sized, and there is still room for an ample setting around them. |
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The organizing element of the fresco is the architecture, comprising a foreground terrace and set of steps backed by a giant edifice of two flat bays that are joined by a central barrel vault. Two parallel vaults, set back in space, echo and reinforce the first vault. The result is a symmetrical composition with a strong focus on the central axis under the vaults. The figures are then arranged evenly (though avoiding the rigidity of absolute symmetry) across the space. |
| Raphael
uses geometric shapes throughout the fresco. The vaults are semi-circles,
while the rest of the architecture is based on squares and rectangles.
There is a kind of balance and predictability to the geometric regularity
of the composition, which produces a calm effect. Plato and Aristotle, silhouetted against the sky and framed by the barrel vaults, are the central figures of the composition and thus become the iconographic center as well. |
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