Vatican Museums

Four centuries after the Dedication of Saint Peter’s Basilica (18 November 1626), this exhibition – part of the Museums at Work programme – aims to celebrate that event as a founding moment of the Roman Church and of the Baroque art that served it. The tapestries from the Barberini Manufactory, Urban VIII dedicates the Basilica of St. Peter and the Resurrection of Christ – the latter evoking Holy Easter – are a testament to the only Roman manufactory capable of competing with the great foreign workshops, translating the liturgical and political solemnity of the pontificate of Urban VIII (1623–1644) into fabric. The exhibition – curated by Alessandra Rodolfo, Head of the Vatican Museums’ Department of XVII-XVIII Century Art and the Department of Tapestries and Textiles – is organized in synergy and close collaboration with the Vatican Apostolic Library and the Fabric of Saint Peter, and is on display in Rooms XVII and XVIII of the Vatican Pinacoteca.

The tapestry depicting the Resurrection of Christ, part of the series on the Life of Christ (1643–1656), is exhibited in Room XVII of the Pinacoteca. The work is accompanied by a reproduction of the preparatory cartoon used for the weaving, produced by the Viterbo-born painter Giovan Francesco Romanelli (now preserved in Palazzo Barberini). Meanwhile, Room XVIII houses Giovan Lorenzo Bernini’s bust of Urban VIII Barberini (1632-1633), on loan from the Vatican Apostolic Library. The bronze bust, originally located in the rooms of the Library of Palazzo Barberini, is displayed alongside the tapestry Urban VIII dedicates Saint Peter’s Basilica, part of the Life of Urban VIII series (1663–1679). Also from the collections of the Vatican Apostolic Library, Department of the Numismatic Cabinet, are two medals by Gaspare Mola relating to the event.
The Fabric of Saint Peter has loaned a 1626 Diary of the Basilica, a rare document from the Archives of the Chapter of Saint Peter, which describes the Dedication ceremony.

“The works on display offer the opportunity to commemorate a moment of particular historical and symbolic significance”, comments the Director of the Vatican Museums Barbara Jatta, “aimed at reaffirming the site that houses the Confessio of the Apostle Peter as the visible foundation of the primacy of the Roman Church, which the three Vatican institutions—the Fabric of Saint Peter, the Vatican Apostolic Library and the Vatican Museums – have sought to celebrate together”.