The Vatican Museums: Home of the Hallowed (and Spectacular!) Sistine Chapel

This is part of a continuing series of photographs from my 21-day, three country,
five city winter vacation to Europe with my ladyfriend Serena.
In this post, we say “arrivederci” to Rome with a look inside the extraordinary Vatican Museums

If you’ve been following my recent posts from our time in Rome, you’d know that I’ve found this remarkable city worthy of all the hype (and I don’t impress easily). We only spent three full days in Rome and it was at least ten days too few. This is not a city for a quick stopover just to post a selfie of yourself in front of the Trevi Fountain; Rome requires your full attention for at least five full days (and it still won’t be enough). That said, I’ll most certainly be back in Rome in the future. But for now, let’s get to the reason why we’re all here – The Vatican Museums.

The Vatican Museums (Musei Vaticani)

“The Vatican, the Museum of Museums,” not only houses the extensive collections of art, archaeology and ethno-anthropology gathered by the Popes over the centuries, it also contains some of the Apostolic Palace’s most extraordinary and artistically significant rooms. The museums contain roughly 70,000 works (of which 20,000 are on display) and currently employ 640 people who work in 40 different administrative, scholarly, and restoration departments.
 

Laocoön and His Sons

The Vatican Museums trace their origin to a single marble sculpture, purchased in the 16th century: ‘Laocoön and His Sons’ was discovered on January 14, 1506, in a vineyard near the basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome. The Pope put the sculpture, which represents the Trojan priest Laocoön and his two sons, Antiphantes and Thymbraeus being attacked by giant serpents, on public display at the Vatican exactly one month after its discovery (it’s still on display today).
 

 
The popes were among the first sovereigns who opened the art collections of their palaces to the public thus promoting knowledge of art history and culture. The Vatican houses some 26 museums and numerous galleries with priceless masterpieces and important archaeological and cultural collections. It’s also visited by more than 6 million people each year.
 

 
I won’t bore you with a listing of all the different galleries, what year they were opened, and by which Pope. They have expanded through the years (if you’re curious, click here) but any history of the museums’ collections should rightly begin with the history of the rooms that the Popes over the ages chose as places of residence or private prayer and reflection.
 

 
One such room is the pope’s official residence in Vatican City and the site of the papal conclave, the process by which a new Pope is selected by a two-thirds supermajority vote. And like Leonardo da Vinci’s “Mona Lisa” in the Musée du Louvre in Paris, I would assume that most people pay a visit to the museum to behold Michelangelo’s stunning work inside the hallowed Sistine Chapel.

“Without having seen the Sistine Chapel one can form no appreciable idea of what one man is capable of achieving.” ~ Goethe

Now, the Sistine Chapel is straight up bonkers (more on that in a minute) but this museum has so much more to offer. From wall-sized maps of Italy and its territories from the 16th century to classical Greek and Roman sculptures and even stunning ancient Egyptian artifacts – you really need to dedicate a whole day to visiting this remarkable museum.

 

 
A large section of the Vatican Museums’ itinerary is also dedicated to the collection of modern and contemporary art. Emerging from Paul VI’s desire to reinstate the dialogue between the Church and contemporary culture, this young collection covers a time span from the end of the nineteenth century up to the early twentieth century by such artists as artists as Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Georges Seurat, Vincent van Gogh, Georges Rouault, Henri Matisse, and Pablo Picasso.
 

Salvatore Fiume | Jesus repels Demons from the Deathbed of St. Joseph, 1974

Inaugurated on 23 June 1973 at the behest of Pope Montini, it brings together paintings, sculpture and graphic arts donated over the years by artists, collectors, and public and private entities. The majority of the donations resulted from contacts established by Paul VI though his address to the art world in an encounter on May 7, 1964 inside the Sistine Chapel.
 

The Sistine Chapel (Cappella Sistina)

The Sistine Chapel was executed by a team of painters made up initially of Pietro Perugino, Sandro Botticelli, Domenico Ghirlandaio and Cosimo Rosselli, assisted by their respective shops. On the Ceiling Pier Matteo d’Amelia painted a starry sky. The work on the frescoes began in 1481 and was concluded in 1482.
 

 
Julius II decided to partly alter the decoration and in 1508, entrusted the work to some artist named Michelangelo Buonarroti. The chapel’s fame now lies mainly in those very frescoes that decorate its interior, most particularly the Sistine Chapel ceiling (a cornerstone work of High Renaissance art) and The Last Judgment (which Michelangelo began painting in 1536, 25 years after finishing the Sistine Chapel ceiling), which covers the whole altar wall of the Sistine Chapel.
 

 
Alas, photographs are not allowed inside the Sistine Chapel (there are several security attendants throughout the chapel keeping an eye out for anyone pointing their cameras up to the ceiling). However, as I arrived in my hotel room later that evening, I realized that I must have accidentally snapped a photograph of the ceiling with my camera phone as I was holding it by my side. Unbeknownst to me, my finger must have pressed the shutter button as the selfie lens of the camera was pointing upwards. I will admit, I was surprised that it came out reasonably well and I’ll further admit that I felt rather fortunate to have had this little “immaculate imperception”, if you will.
 
That’s my story and I’m sticking to it. And if you hadn’t guessed already, the Sistine Chapel is “banane!” Nuff said.
 


 
The modern double helix staircase, commonly referred to as the “Bramante Staircase”, was designed by Giuseppe Momo, sculpted by Antonio Maraini and realized by the Ferdinando Marinelli Artistic Foundry in 1932. It was inspired by the original Bramante Staircase which was was built by Italian architect Donato Bramante in 1505 to provide access to the residential upper floors and deliver whatever was necessary to the Pope. It is not generally open to the public.
 

 
Several architecture professors have speculated that Momo’s staircase (particularly the skylight and atrium, and the helical nature of the ramp and the technical aspects of its construction) was the inspiration for Frank Lloyd Wright’s design for the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York.
 

 
The Vatican Museums are open From Monday to Saturday, 8am–8pm (final entry 6pm). Full entry ticket will set you back €20.00 and a “Skip the Line” ticket purchased online (what we did) is €25.00. There are reduced tickets for pilgrimages and students. There is also FREE ENTRY every last Sunday of the month (and I can only imagine how crowded it must get in there!). Do not miss this truly remarkable museum. More images in the gallery below…

And just like that, we were waiting on an Uber to take us to the Roma Termini railway station to catch a train to our next city, Naples…

This will wrap up our time in Rome – and what a city it was. “Torneremo!” Next up is Naples so
SUBSCRIBE HERE to not miss it. All the cool kids have already done it. Just saying…All photographs taken with the Xiaomi 13 Ultra For more information on why you should visit Rome, check out the Rome Tourism and Travel Guide