Raffaello Sanzio (1483-1520), after, After - Il trionfo di Galatea

Late 18th century–early 19th century, After Raphael Sanzio
The Triumph of Galatea
Oil on canvas, 95 x 71 cm
With frame, 114 x 89 cm

The work depicts Galatea’s maritime apotheosis, caught as she glides the waters above a monumental shell repurposed as a chariot, whose reins drive a pair of dolphins immersed in the lapping waves. The Nereid figure is posed in a lively, plastic contrapposto: while the bust and lower limbs follow the motion toward the right, the face turns backward in a torsion that has a strong scenographic effect. The dynamism of the composition is further heightened by the broad red mantle that wraps the heroine’s hips and billows under the wind, transforming into an ideal sail that frames the figure and elevates her anatomical grace. From an iconographic and structural point of view, the invention draws on the Renaissance archetype exemplar fixed by Raphael Sanzio in the famous fresco completed around 1511–1512 for the suburban villa in Trastevere of the rich Sienese banker and papal treasurer Agostino Chigi, today known as the Villa Farnesina. In this ambitious project, designed as a pleasure villa devoted to literary leisure and patronage, the decoration of the Loggia of Galatea saw the Urbino master working in direct competition with Baldassarre Peruzzi (author of the astrological cycle on the vault) and with the Venetian Sebastiano del Piombo, who painted the adjacent and melancholic Polyphemus. By drawing on Angelo Poliziano’s Stanze per la Giostra, Raphael defined a perfect balance between ancient monumental grandeur and fluid rhythm, materializing what, in a famous letter to Baldassarre Castiglione, he called his “certain idea” of ideal beauty, not copied from a real model but conceived in the artist’s mind.

The frame is provided as a gift, therefore it cannot be grounds for return or complaint.

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