Cappella Sistina, Rome

Cappella Sistina is the chapel housed in the Apostolic Palace at Vatican City, the papal residence. It takes its name from Pope Sixtus the Fourth, who commissioned it during the span from fourteen seventy-three to fourteen eighty-one. Baccio Pontelli created its design, in Renaissance architecture, a manner shaped by the revived forms and ideals of ancient Rome.

Its outward face is notably plain, without the elaborate display you might expect from the art held within. The long interior stretches about thirty-five metres, while the vault rises about twenty metres. Along the walls, painters including Botticelli, Perugino, Ghirlandaio, and Rosselli created fresco cycles pairing episodes from Moses’s life with scenes from Christ’s life; portraits of popes occupy the band above them.

Michelangelo transformed the vault under Julius the Second, painting it from fifteen oh eight to fifteen twelve. He later returned to cover the altar wall with The Last Judgment, completed during the span from fifteen thirty-five to fifteen forty-one. This is also where cardinals gather in conclave to choose a new pope.

A chimney is fitted on the roof for that election, and its smoke announces whether the voting has produced a pope. The chapel was consecrated for the Virgin Mary on the Feast of the Assumption in fourteen eighty-three.