4 ...

Newkirk (topping up glasses of red wine):
Each of you has fairly particular ideas about what constitutes the best in painting, and in sculpture and architecture ... at least that is my understanding; please correct me if I'm wrong.

Bernini (looks around the table and the others nod in agreement):
Fair enough. Go on.

Gian Lorenzo Bernini, self-portrait as a young man, c. 1623

Newkirk:
Let me tell you just what it is that I like about the work each of you makes. First, I guess I need to explain some of the historical categories, for lack of a better word, into which art historians have placed you and your achievements.

Raphael, your painting has long been considered to be the epitome of what is now known as the High Renaissance style. The term "Renaissance" is not one that you yourselves would be familiar with, as it was not widely used to describe the period in which you live, until the mid to late 19th century. 

Michelangelo (putting down his glass and challenging Newkirk gruffly):
What are you saying? What do you mean "renaissance?" Are you trying to tell us that he (nodding towards a grinning Raphael) is the best, the epitome? Pah. (returns to his veal limone)

Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, 1474 - 1564. portrait of Michelangelo Buonarroti 

Chalk portrait by Daniele da Volterra

Newkirk:
Well, not quite, Michelangelo. It's not as simple as that. You too are considered the "best," as is Gian Lorenzo here. Historians love to package periods in our past, to make those periods more what ? ... understandable, easily digested, comfortably compared with other periods? You may be familiar with the term Middle Ages, which roughly refers to the period between the fall of Rome, and Giotto's time. As well as referring to that time as the Middle Ages, we have called that same "in between" time, the Medieval period, since the late 19th century. I think what I am trying to say is that, for the sake of explaining things to students of the history of art, we have packaged each of you – I know that sounds terrible – within larger packages called Renaissance, or High Renaissance, or in the case of Gian Lorenzo, Baroque.

Raphael (tearing off a piece of bread from the small loaf on the table):
Very well, you have placed us in categories. I understand this, although I do not necessarily approve. Now, explain how each of us is "the best."

Raphael, Self Portrait c1504 (Ashmolean Museum, Oxford )