Raphael’s School of Athens review – rewarding study of Renaissance fresco

During the latest in Howard Burton’s Masterpiece series, the art historian turns his low-tech but scholarly attention to Raphael’s interior decoration in the Vatican palaceHere is the latest in the series of high-minded, low-tech studies of Renaissance art history from Howard Burton, a theoretical physicist turned art historian, who has launched a series of films called, with admirable Ronseal-ness, Renaissance Masterpieces. Having already looked over Botticelli’s Primavera, Burton now turns to Raphael’s wall fresco in the Vatican palace, arguably the high point of the artist’s prodigious output and a work to rival Michelangelo’s Sistine chapel decorations.Burton has already tackled The School of Athens as part of his mammoth survey of Raphael’s entire oeuvre, Raphael: A Portrait, but here he gets to drill down in considerable detail for the film’s 81-minute running time. Admittedly, the visuals are as rudimentary as Burton’s previous offerings – it looks like a glorified PowerPoint, with Burton’s sonorous commentary overlaid in unpunctuated voiceover – but as before, the tone works: Burton is scholarly without being dull, and clear without being obvious. Continue reading...

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