The Agony in the Garden

Raphael painted this Agony in the Garden around 1504 as one of five predella panels for the Colonna Altarpiece in Perugia, his major commission from this early period. The scene shows Christ in prayer on the Mount of Olives while the three apostles — Peter, James, and John — sleep in the foreground. Raphael's composition follows Perugino's model closely while introducing more individuated figures and subtler landscape atmospheric effects. The sleeping disciples arranged at differing angles demonstrate his developing mastery of varied figure poses. This predella panel is now at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, separated from the main altarpiece, which is at the Metropolitan and other American and European institutions — a dispersion typical of Italian altarpieces in the art market.

Oil on panel showing Raphael's youthful assimilation of Perugino's spatial clarity and gentle sfumato. The atmospheric landscape and delicate figure proportions reveal an artist already surpassing his teacher's refinement.