Raphael

"Renaissance artists of the 15th century, were interested in form, and in the underlying reality of the natural world. Light, optics, mathematics -- all were as important keys .... But there is no grander, more impressive example of all this than Raphael's magnificent "School of Athens." Here Plato, on the left, holds a copy of his Timaeus, and gestures upward to the ethereal realm of his eternal forms; in contrast, Aristotle's hand is outstretched -- he holds a copy of his Nichomachean Ethics -- and he indicates with his gesture the worldliness, the concreteness, of his contributions to philosophy. On the right are the geometers and astronomers; just off from center, wearing the clothes of a 16th century stonecutter is Michelangelo. Throughout the School of Athens there is an emphasis on mathematics, number, ratio, harmony. Pythagoras is represented by his theory of mathematical harmony on the left, Euclid by the perfection of Geometry on the right -- and the elaborate perspective design of the architectural setting seems to embody both."

Joseph W. Dauben, Prof. of History and the History of Science Lehman College, City University of New York