Exhibition Tour—Raphael: Sublime Poetry

Join Carmen Bambach, Marica F. and Jan T. Vilcek Curator in the Department of Drawings and Prints, and Daniel Kershaw, Exhibition Design Manager, and Caroline Elenowitz-Hess, Research Associate, to virtually explore Raphael: Sublime Poetry, on view at The Met from March 29 through June 28, 2026.

Dive into the artistic process of one of history's most beloved and influential artists. A true titan of the Italian Renaissance, Raffaello di Giovanni Santi (1483–1520)—better known as Raphael—matched ambition with lyricism to create works with both intellectual heft and emotional depth, a necessary skill in the complex political landscape of Renaissance courts. In his short life of only 37 years, he achieved such profound success as a painter, designer, and architect that he was regarded as the pinnacle of artistic perfection for centuries after his death.

Raphael: Sublime Poetry is the first comprehensive exhibition on Raphael in the United States, bringing together more than 170 of the artist’s greatest masterpieces and rarely seen treasures to illuminate the brilliance of Raphael’s extraordinary creativity. The son of a painter and poet, Raphael engaged with the foremost writers and thinkers of his age in Rome, displaying a poetic sensibility that captivated his peers and generations that followed. Follow the full breadth of his life and career, from his origins in Urbino to his rise in Florence, where he began to emerge as a peer of Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo, to his final, prolific decade at the papal court in Rome.

Learn more about the exhibition: https://www.metmuseum.org/exhibitions/raphael-sublime-poetry

Video produced by The Metropolitan Museum of Art and  SandenWolff, Inc.

Production credits:

Managing Producer: Kate Farrell

Senior Producer: Melissa Bell

Associate Producer: Lela Jenkins

Production Assistant: Rozie Brockington

Director: Jonathan Sanden

Camera: Jonathan Sanden, Noah Therrien, Thomas Lange

Editors: Hannah Kaylor and Jonathan Sanden

Music: Courtesy of Uppbeat, Jamendo, and Premium Beat