Enfilade

For the implications of the Raphael cartoons during the eighteenth century, see Arline Meyer, Apostles in England: Sir James Thornhill & the Legacy of the Raphael’s Tapestry Cartoons, exhibition catalogue (New York: Columbia University, 1996); and more recently, Cathleen Hoeniger, The Afterlife of Raphael’s Paintings (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), especially chapter 5, “The English Reception and Restoration of Raphael’s Cartoons, c. 1525-1800” (this latter text is also useful for Raphael’s reception in France and Germany). The following description of the exhibition in London comes from the V&A’s website:

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Raphael: Cartoons and Tapestries for the Sistine Chapel
Victoria & Albert Museum, London, 8 September — 17 October 2010

This is a display of four of the ten tapestries designed by Raphael for the Sistine Chapel in Vatican City. These are the original tapestries from the only series designed by Raphael of which examples survive, and are comparable with Michelangelo’s Sistine Chapel Ceiling as masterpieces of High Renaissance art. The tapestries are displayed alongside the full-size designs for them – the famous Raphael Cartoons . This is the first time that the designs and tapestries have been displayed together – something Raphael himself never witnessed. The tapestries have not been shown before in the UK.

The tapestries of the Acts of St Peter and St Paul, The Miraculous Draught of Fishes, Christ’s Charge to Peter, The Healing of the Lame Man, and The Sacrifice at Lystra, were made for the Sistine Chapel almost 500 years ago. Raphael was commissioned by Pope Leo X to design these great tapestries, which were woven in Brussels, Europe’s leading centre for tapestry-weaving, and then sent to Rome for display. As the cartoons remained in Brussels, Raphael himself never saw the cartoons beside the tapestries woven from them. Several European monarchs, including Henry VIII, later commissioned copies of the tapestries which were made from the cartoons in Brussels. In 1623 Charles I, while Prince of Wales, had the Cartoons brought to England to have his own set woven in the Mortlake tapestry workshops, and they have remained in England ever since.

The Vatican Museums own the tapestries from the Sistine Chapel. The Cartoons belong to The Queen, but have been on long-term loan to the V&A since Queen Victoria lent them in 1865. The Cartoons are too fragile to leave the Museum building so they have never left the V&A. The four tapestries will be hung in the V&A’s Raphael Gallery next to the seven Cartoons. The design of each cartoon corresponds in every point, but in reverse, to the tapestry it was made for. The weavers cut Raphael’s cartoons into strips and copied them closely, weaving each tapestry from the back. The front image was therefore the reverse of its cartoon. The painted strips of cartoon were joined together again later, and became prized as artworks in their own right.

The exhibition will include preparatory drawings for the Cartoons, on loan from the Royal Collection and the Musée du Louvre, and a 17th century Mortlake tapestry of The Miraculous Draught of Fishes, lent by The 9th Duke of Buccleuch’s Chattels Fund. A small number of other loans from the Vatican Museums, the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana and the Maestro delle Celebrazioni Liturgche del Sommo Pontefice will also be included relating to Pope Leo X and the Sistine Chapel. The exhibition of the tapestries will take place over a six week period to coincide with the historic visit to England and Scotland of Pope Benedict XVI.