9. Raphael Santi or Sanzio,
1483-1520
Baldassar Castiglione

     The Grand Gallerie in the Louvre Museum in Paris is the length of three Washington Monuments laid end-to-end — the longest room in Europe. On my first visit, I was struck by the fact that I had walked the entire length of this gigantic exhibition hall before I encountered a single portrait of any real interest. It was Raphael's Baldassar Castiglione. Perhaps the first truly great portrait of the Italian Renaissance, it is magnificent in design, brilliant in execution, and vividly portrays a unique human being at a specific moment in time.
     Everything is right here — the composition is magnificently simple, the shapes are decorative and well-related, the colors are conservative and elegant. But — handsome as this is as a piece of graphic design in two dimensions, Baldassar Castiglione gives us a highly believable human being — thoughtful, vulnerable, rather like people we know. Above all else, portraiture is about the human dimension.

Louvre Museum, Paris