VATICAN CITY (AP) — One of the most intricately decorated parts of the Vatican’s Apostolic Palace, a passageway walked by popes and presidents and attributed to Renaissance master Raphael, is getting its first major face-lift in over 500 years.The Vatican Museums on Wednesday announced the start of a five-year, $5.5 million project to clean and restore the Raphael Loggia, a 65-meter (yard) long, 4-meter (yard) wide corridor that is considered one of the highest expressions of Renaissance figurative art.The windowed second floor corridor, which overlooks the palace’s San Damaso courtyard, is not open to the public. But lucky visitors to the pope or Secretariat of State walk along it en route to their audiences and are treated to biblical scenes, from the Old Testament and New, as well as botanical motifs in painting and stucco.Pope Leo XIV, who moved back into the Apostolic Palace after Pope Francis famously stayed away, has his private apartments upstairs but walks along the corridor when going to audiences.
Raphael conceived of the decoration between 1517-1519 as one of his last commissions for Pope Leo X, alongside his more well-known and accessible masterpieces that are today highlights of any visit to the Vatican Museums: the recently restored Raphael Rooms and his tapestries.
