Four hundred years after the Dedication of St. Peter’s Basilica on November 18, 1626, the exhibition The Barberini Tapestry. The Resurrection and Dedication of the Vatican Basilica, which can be visited from March 30, 2026 at the Vatican Pinacoteca and is part of the Museums at Work program, aims to recall that event as a fundamental moment for the Roman Church and for the development of Baroque art in its service.
The protagonists of the exhibition are the tapestries of the Barberini Manufactory, in particular Urban VIII dedicates St. Peter’s Basilica and the Resurrection of Christ, the latter in symbolic relation to Easter: testimonies of the most important Roman manufactory capable of competing with the great European ones. These works translate into textile form the religious and political solemnity of the pontificate of Urban VIII (1623-1644).
The exhibition, curated by Alessandra Rodolfo, head of the Department for the Art of the 17th-18th Centuries and the Tapestries and Textiles Department of the Vatican Museums, is realized in collaboration with the Vatican Apostolic Library and the Fabbrica di San Pietro, and is set up in Rooms XVII and XVIII of the Vatican Picture Gallery.
Room XVII exhibits the tapestry with the Resurrection of Christ, belonging to the Life of Christ series (1643-1656), flanked by the reproduction of the preparatory cartoon used for the weaving, made by the Viterbo painter Giovan Francesco Romanelli and now preserved in Palazzo Barberini.
Room XVIII, on the other hand, houses the bronze bust of Urban VIII (1632-1633), the work of Gian Lorenzo Bernini and from the Vatican Library. The portrait is displayed next to the tapestry Urban VIII Dedicates St. Peter’s Basilica, part of the series Life of Urban VIII (1663-1679). Also from the same collections come two medals made by Gaspare Mola on the occasion of the Dedication.
Completing the exhibition is a precious Diary of the Basilica from 1626, granted by the Fabbrica di San Pietro and coming from theChapter Archives, which documents in detail the course of the ceremony, offering direct testimony of that historic event.
“The works on display,” explains the director of the Vatican Museums, Barbara Jatta, "offer an opportunity to re-enact a moment of particular historical as well as symbolic importance, aimed at reaffirming the place that holds the Confessio of the Apostle Peter as the visible foundation of the primacy of the Roman Church, which the three Vatican institutions, the Fabbrica di San Pietro, the Vatican Apostolic Library and the Vatican Museums, intended to celebrate together.
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| Vatican Pinacoteca, Barberini tapestries on display for the 400th anniversary of the Dedication of St. Peter's Basilica |
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