​The chapel was consecrated on October 31, 1483.

The greatest artists of the time were in Rome to decorate the main church of the papacy. Great names as Botticelli, Ghirlandaio and Perugino worked in the room for two years painting the walls of the chapel with the stories of Moses and Jesus. Below these pictures are painted tapestries, and above pictures of popes.

What remains of this decoration are the sidewalls only.
​The altar wall paintings were cancelled to house Michelangelo’s last judgment. While the main entrance wall was damaged when it collapsed in the fifteen hundred, therefore new paintings were realized by less important artists.
The picture shows you how the Sistine chapel looked like before Michelangelo interventions.

​A splendid image of the original accommodation of the tapestries woven in the 15 hundreds in Bruxelles from cartoons painted by Raphael. The pope Leo X committed these priceless works to ornate the side walls of the Sistine chapel.

The legend of Michelangelo being a lonely painter taking care of the strenuous work of painting alone the 12.000 square feet of the Sistine chapel is not true.

When Michelangelo got the commission he was an extremely skilled sculptor but initially lacked familiarity with the complex fresco technique.  

He also had still in mind the project of the tomb of Julius II and it’s believed he wanted to delegate a large part of the  pictorial execution to assistants.

Michelangelo got a Florentine friend that he trusted: his name was Francesco Granacci.

The 2 artists had studied together in Ghirlandaio workshop and in the garden of San Marco, that Michelangelo eventually entered thanks to Granacci's advise. Granacci never begun a very renewed painter.

He was unambitious, an easy living man and had a relaxed temper. In fact he specialized in less important decoration as theatrical scenery, banners for churches and knights, triumphal arches for parades.

Granacci’s  lack of desire for glory was engaging for Michelangelo.  Granacci easily acknowledged his supremacy, there was not artistic competition.

He entrusted Francesco Granacci to recruit the assistant he needed in Florence.

March 12th, 2013 at 12.30.
sPeople who attended the mass in St Peter are exiing the church.
The atmosphere is very alive!
This morning service was open to everyone to join the cardinal in prayer for the successful election of the new Pope.
An historical moment that many faithful participated to.

The Sistine Chapel has closed to the visitors yesterday: March the 5th. 
The Conclave preparation begun. 
From now onwards it's all secret.
The Vatican museum can be visited, and are worth of, without having access to the Borgia Apartments and Modern Religious Art sections too.

This is one of my favorite Michelangelo's quote:

The Sistine chapel dimensions are believed to recall the same measures of the great temple of Salomon in Jerusalem, destroyed by Titus in AD 70.

The length is 40,23 meters and the height  is 20,70. 
The Sistine chapel is 13,40 meters wide, the same space occupied by 20 persons standing on the side one of the other. 

Tomorrow, October 31st 2012, will be the 500 years birthday of Michelangelo’s genesis, the amazing painting program he realized along the course of 4 years for the pope Julius the II.
It was the same pope Julius the II to unveil the marvelous ceiling with the celebration of the Vespers Mass of All Saints’ Day on October 31st of the year 1512.

One of the most interesting paintings on display in the exhibit “Il Rinascimento a Roma nel segno di Michelangelo e Raffaello” ( held at palazzo Spada, Rome until 18 March 2012) was the copy of Michelangelo’s Last Judgment realized by Marcello Venusti in 1549.