Last Exhibitions:

16 October 2009 - 16 January 2010

Vatican Museums, (Sala Polifunzionale)

On occasion of the International Year of Astronomy and of the 4th Centenary of the introduction of astronomic observation, the National Institute of Astrophysics (INAF), the Vatican Observatory and the Vatican Museums have organized an exhibition. It falls under the patronage of His Eminence The Cardinal Secretary of the Vatican State, of the President of the Italian Republic and of the following institutions: Pontifical Council for Culture, Pontifical Academy of Sciences and the Ministry for Universities and for Research.
Due to its scientific and historical approach, the exhibition is orientated on the history, functioning and evolution of the different instruments created by Man over ten centuries for the observation of the sky, for the location of the stars and celestial bodies.
An important selection of the most precious and rarest instruments for astronomic observation, lent by many Italian observatories, will be on show for the public to admire.
All the items are part of the property of the INAF, and were created between the 11th and 20th century and are largely unknown by the general public. The visitor will also be able to admire other items belonging to the Vatican State, on loan from the Vatican Observatory, the Vatican Apostolic Library as well as other important works of art (paintings, celestial globes and earth globes from different periods) normally housed in the Vatican Museums or belonging to private Italian collectors.

Opening hours of the Vatican Museums. Open Monday to Sunday: the Ticket Office is open from 9 am to 4 pm.
The Museums close at 6 pm. Closed: Sunday; 8, 25, 26 December 2009; 1, 6 January 2010.
Free Entrance the last Sunday of every month from 9 am to 12.30 am. The Museum close at 2 pm.

The Entrance Ticket to the Vatican Museums enables the visit of the exhibition
Entrance Ticket only for the exhibition (booked online): Euro 4,00
Entrance Ticket only for the exhibition (purchased by the Ticket Office of the Vatican Museums): Euro 5,00

26 giugno 2009 - 27 settembre 2009

Vatican Museums, The Pio Cristiano Museum

The most ancient portrayal of Paul's martyrdom, detail of a sarcophagus with trees, dating from around the middle of the 5th Century A.D. Vatican Museums, The Pio Cristiano Museum

As we reach the end of the Pauline Year, this exhibition invites the visitors to the Vatican Museums to rediscover the figure and the work of Saint Paul, through selected works of art housed in various cultural institutions of the Holy See. The exhibition is occasioned through a combined initiative of Prof. Antonio Paolucci, Director of the Vatican Museums and His Excellency Mons. Gianfranco Ravasi, President of the Pontifical Council for Culture, and was made possible thanks to the contribution of the Department of Christian Antiquities of the Vatican Museums.
The first section focuses on the historical and artistic remains which come from the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside-The-Walls, now housed in the Vatican Museums.
A second section accompanies the visitor to discovering the origins of Saint Paul's iconography within Christian Art. From the portrait of the philosophers, including the one resembling Plotinus, to the birth of the Apostle Paul's "face", portraying the characteristic features which have been handed down through sentries of Christian Art.
The third section invites the visitor to rediscover the presence of Saint Paul in the Vatican through important works of art coming from the ancient Basilica of Saint Peter, before its reconstruction in the 16th Century.
In the last section the visitor can follow the journey of the evangelical announcement of Paul through precious renaissance illuminations, printed books in the vulgate and in the more recent translations, including the inter-confessional text used by all Christians.

The ticket is included in the entrance ticket to the Museums.

The catalogue is available in the different bookshops in the Vatican Museums.