A stitch in time

In the history of Papal patronage the Sistine Chapel must still rank as one of the most ostentatious – and magnificent – of commissions. Hardly a square inch of wall remains undecorated, with the whole scheme dominated by Michelangelo’s dramatic ceiling fresco and his vast Last Judgement scene, which spreads across the entire wall behind the altar.

Faced with this onslaught, the exquisite tapestries designed by Raphael can sometimes be unfairly overlooked by visitors (the commission must have rankled – the two were, after all, great rivals). But as Dr. Arnold Nesselrath, curator of the Vatican Museums explains, ‘the tapestries are absolutely as important as the works by Michelangelo. After all there is more wall space not painted by Michelangelo than there is.’

Now, for the first time since the tapestries were created, Raphael’s cartoons for the designs and four of the original tapestries for which they were made will be brought together for six weeks only at London’s Victoria & Albert Museum.

The series of ten tapestries, depicting the acts of St Peter and St Paul, were commissioned by Pope Leo X in 1515 as the final part of the Chapel’s overall scheme. Tapestry designs begin first as ‘cartoons’ which are then sent as a design guide from which the weavers worked. In the case of the Sistine tapestries, the cartoons were sent to Brussels to be woven - meaning that Raphael never saw his cartoons next to the finished works.

In 1623 Charles I, then Prince of Wales, had the cartoons brought to England to have his own set woven, and they have remained in England ever since. The only items in Charles’s possession not to be sold off by Oliver Cromwell, they subsequently formed part of the Royal Collection and have been on loan to the V&A since being sent for display by Queen Victoria in 1865.

The four tapestries on loan to the V&A from the Vatican, which will be displayed next to their cartoons, depict The Miraculous Draught of Fishes, Christ’s Charge to Peter, The Healing of the Lame Man and The Sacrifice at Lystra. They have been sent to London to mark the visit to the capital by Pope Benedict XVI this September. The exhibition will also include preparatory drawings for the cartoons, a 17th century English tapestry of The Miraculous Draft of the Fishes and a number of other loans relating to Pope Leo X and the Sistene Chapel.

The exhibition is free, but pre-booking is recommended