Raphael Loggias in Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg, Russia - Encircle Photos

Raphael Loggias in Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg, Russia

Catherine the Great admired everything beautiful and often copied what she could not own. An example is the Raphael Loggias. In the late 1780s, she commissioned a reproduction of the Gallery in the Papal Palace in Vatican City originally painted by Raphael in the 15th century. Architect Giacomo Quarenghi created this loggia, the Italian name for an exterior corridor supported by columns and arches. Then artists decorated it with bas-reliefs and paintings with Biblical stories. Notice at top is an angel banishing Adam and Even from the Garden of Eden.

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