The Transfiguration

During the last few years of his life, specifically from 1516 to 1520, Raphael spent his time working on this altarpiece commissioned by Cardinal Giulio de Medici of the famous Medici family, who would later become Pope Clement VII. When he was originally assigned to this painting, Raphael had many other projects going on, including further work on the “Stanze”, however the Cardinal encouraged him to work by commissioning Sebastiano del Piombo to paint a second altarpiece, titled The Raising of Lazarus. When Raphael died unexpectedly in 1520, The Transfiguration was not yet finished. It is believed that his students Giulio Romano and Gianfrancesco Penni completed it for him shortly after his death. Once it was finished, the Cardinal had it donated to the church of San Pietro in Montorio, instead of sending it to the cathedral of San Giusto of Narbonne, France, as was originally intended. However, in 1797, French troops led by Napoleon took it to Paris under the Treaty of Tolentino, where it stayed until it was returned to the Vatican in 1816 after the fall of Napoleon. The work itself depicts Christ flanked by the prophets Moses and Elijah, while in the foreground the Apostles meet the possessed boy who will later be cured by the recently-transfigured Christ. It is described in Raphael’s biography, written by Giorgio Vasari, as “the most famous, the most beautiful and most divine” work of Raphael.