Raphael in the Vatican [antikvár]

Raphael and the Vatican Museums There is no place in the world so perfect for a thoroughgoing study of the works of Raphael as the Vatican Museums. And yet, when the Pontifical Museums were founded as a public cultural institution at the end ofthe 18th century, Raphael hardly existed for them. There were, of course, the Rooms and the Loggias of the Vatican Palace, with their famous frescoes which had been admired, studied and exalted by generations of artists; and they stood right beside the Pius- Clementine Museum. But the decorated Palace areas had no connection with the Museum. The idea of a Pinacoteca had not yet begun to circulate in the Vatican, and in only a very few rooms -the private picture gallery - of the Apostolic Palace ofthe Quirinal could one see and admire works by Raphael, or attributed to him. Clement XI, in 1711, purchased from the Theatine Congregation of the Church of San Silvestro al Quirinale the Saint Peter of Raphael and Fra Bartolommeo's Saint Paul; and Clement XII believed that he was acquiring a Raphael in the portrait of Saint John the Baptist now considered to be the work of Giulio Romano and Gian Francesco Penni. The painting, originally the property of the Maronites, is still to be found in the Quirinal When, in 1790, Pius VIfounded a Pinacoteca in the Vatican, the panels of Saint Peter and Saint Paul were transferred there. The new collection also had several works attributed to Raphael or his circle: a copy of the Transfiguration ofthe Church ofSan Pietro in Montorio, a Nativity by G.F. Penni, Giulio Romano's great cartoon of the Stoning of Saint Stephen, a 'sketch' ofthe Vatican Rooms fresco of Saint Peter in Prison, and a Sacra Famiglia attributed to the Master. Most of these works were lost during the revolutionary era: for example, a Sacra Famiglia ascribed to Raphael was offered to a French general as a gift, and subsequently vanished without trace. The small group of works remaining at the Vatican at the beginning of the 19th century went to decorate the Pontifical Palace; for to reopen the Pinacoteca was really out of the question: with the Treaty ofTolentino in 1797, it had lost its most important works. In the meantime, a curious operation was under way at the Vatican Palace. Catherine II of Russia was so enamored of Raphael's works that she wished to have the rooms of her own imperial residence at Tsarskoe Selo decorated with paintings faithfully imitating his style. Andfor the Hermitage of the royal palace at Petersburg, she desired a complete reproduction of the Loggias. Johann Friedrich de Reiffenstein, Counsellor to the Court, was in Rome in 1778, and consulted with Mengs about the matter. Mengs suggested Christopher Unterberger, an Austrian artist then active at the Vatican. In 1779, Unterberger and a group of assistants set to work, and at the end of eight years' labor they finished the copy. The Empress, at the very start, had ordered her Italian architect, Giacomo Quarenghi, to prepare for the copy a special architectural setting, identical to the Loggias. A cork model constructed by Antonio Chichi was sent fi-om the Vatican in 1779, and from it an exact reproduction ofthe Loggias was built on the side of the Palace overlooking the 'Winter Canal'. The exact copy of the paintings and stuccoes set sail for Russia in 1786; and in 1787 the reproduction was complete: Catherine the Great could stroll through her 'loggias'and feel herself in Rome, at the Vatican Palace.