Parody of Raphael's 'School of Athens'

Reynolds's Parody of Raphael's School of Athens from 1751 is among the most remarkable products of his Italian period and the clearest evidence of the intellectual wit that his formal career largely suppressed. The painting reworks Raphael's fresco of the Athenian philosophers in the Vatican Stanza della Segnatura — arguably the most celebrated painting of the Italian Renaissance — by substituting portraits of contemporary British Grand Tourists for Plato, Aristotle, and their companions. The conceit was a sophisticated act of classical engagement: Reynolds demonstrated his familiarity with Raphael's masterpiece by playing with it, placing himself and his contemporaries in the lineage of ancient philosophy while simultaneously gently satirizing the Grand Tour culture that positioned such identification as the pinnacle of a gentleman's education. Reynolds's Italian period caricatures circulated within the closed world of British Grand Tourists, whose self-aware cultivation allowed them to appreciate jokes at their own expense. The National Gallery of Ireland's holding of this canvas connects it to Joseph Leeson, later Earl of Milltown, who appears in Reynolds's Italian caricatures and whose collection formed the core of the NGI's founding holdings.

The parody captures the original's composition with humorous exaggeration. Reynolds's early draftsmanship demonstrates the wit underlying his later Grand Manner practice.