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Dr. Steven Zucker: Rome gets hot in the summer,
and the wealthy would build villas, that is,
country houses just outside the city's walls.
Dr. Beth Harris: We're in one of those retreats,
the Villa Farnesina, and we've walked through a lovely garden.
Dr. Zucker: We're in this long room that's open to
the river and lets the breezes flow through,
cooling the hot summer airing room.
Dr. Harris: Framing the windows are decorative
frescoes and scenes of Italianate landscapes;
and on the ceiling, frescoes that tell us
in astrological symbols the birthdate
of the patron, whose name was Chigi.
He's a wealthy banker who managed
the financial affairs of the papacy, of Pope Julius II,
who is just north, building a new St. Peter's.
Dr. Zucker: I'm not sure that I would
use the word "wealthy" for Chigi.
I think "fabulously wealthy" would be more appropriate.
The most famous painting
in the villa is by Raphael: Galatea.
Dr. Harris: Galatea was a sea nymph.
She was chased in the scene by Polyphemus,
the one-eyed giant who makes an appearance
in Homer's Odyssey, but also in other mythic stories.
Dr. Zucker: The painting by Raphael shows this nude
who's got this wonderful tortion,
that shows of Raphael's really superb knowledge
of the anatomy of the human body.
Dr. Harris: I think of this pose as so typically
high Renaissance in its complexity.
We can see this spyro twisting of the body
also in Michaelangelo's slaves from about this time.
She's riding on a seashell, being pulled by dolphins.
Dr. Zucker: As if that wasn't enough, you have wind
whipping to her right, so that her hair and
the drapery is pushing out almost horizontally,
to the right, whereas her arms are holding
the dolphins' reins to the left; and so there's
this wonderful accentuated tortion.
Dr. Harris: I think you see that through the whole
composition, of kind of pulling in one direction,
and then pulling in another.
If we look at the sea nymphs and sea creatures
that surround her, they also seem to move out,
pulling her in different directions.
Dr. Zucker: Well, there are these different stresses.
For instance, the nymph in the foreground
is trying to move to her left, but is being
restrained by that male figure.
Dr. Harris: The figures in the background
move in opposing directions.
Dr. Zucker: For all that movement,
this is not a baroque painting.
This is a high Renaissance painting,
and so there is still a sense of clarity and order.
Dr. Harris: In fact, a kind of sense of a pyramid.
Dr. Zucker: Galatea herself is framed by three
groups of figures: you have the nymphs and
the dolphins on the right; you have that
angelic figure, perhaps cupid, in the foreground;
the nymphs on the left.
Then you have three putti at the top,
each with their bows drawn and looking as if
their arrows will be loosed on her.
Dr. Harris: There really is movement and spiraling,
but also, simultaneously, stability and balance.
Dr. Zucker: There's also playfulness.
Look up at the putti again, with the bows and arrows.
There's actually a fourth, with a quiver,
who's hiding behind a cloud, seeming as if he
perhaps is scheming and planning this attack.
Dr. Harris: Or maybe he's supplying
the arrows to the other three cupids.
The figures remind me of Michaelangelo.
I mean, look at how Raphael is accentuating
the musculature of Galatea, and also the
back muscles of those sea creatures.
There's real interest in physicality and musculature
here that's very different from a similar image
by Botticelli of The Birth of Venus, where we have
a female nude rising from the sea.
Dr. Zucker: And so, unlike the Botticelli,
which is so dependent on line, there's real use of
light and shadow, of chiaroscuro, here to really
accentuate the musculature of the body.
Dr. Harris: The figures have weight, unlike the
weightless forms that Botticelli gives us.
Dr. Zucker: Well, they also move through space
in a way that Botticelli's figures don't
because they're so flat and so decorative.
Look, for instance, at the large male figure
in the lower left, and the way his
shoulder comes out towards us.
That's not something that you would see
in those more decorative paintings by Botticelli.
So, I think we shouldn't be taking
these paintings too seriously.
I mean, they're a beautiful expression, of course,
of the high Renaissance interest in the classical,
but this is really about pleasure.
It's about wealth and love.
Dr. Harris: And those themes relate
to the interest of the patron.
Dr. Zucker: He has built this lavish villa
that he can enjoy, and so can we.
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