How Does Art Mirror Society?



School of Athens


     This painting is called the School of Athens, a fresco painting made by Raphael in the year 1510. The School of Athens represents what was happening in the Renaissance through different social classes. You can see most of the different social classes  in the painting through the way they treat one another. For example, the scholars are treated with interest because they knew a lot and people were interested in what their knowledge. Likewise, two men, probably highly respected people, walk down the middle of the painting while everyone else move to the side because they are superior. However, there is one man laying on the stairs, who seems to be a poor person, but as people walk by, they pretend not to even notice him. He is the class of person that would be ignored while others, like scholars and officials are idolised. Thus in the Renaissance, people must have been treated differently and shunned off to the side whilst others would be praised and be given power over others as they almost cower to their superiority. So altogether, the School of Athens mirrored the contributing force of social classes to the Renaissance.