Art in Rome

Blog-o-philes may already know that my record with works of art isn't that good. Every time I step into a gallery it's the day when they're changing all the exhibitions and all there is to be seen are blank walls or workmen scratching their heads.


So it was with some confidence (you can see where this one's going) that Jaki and I set off for the Santa Maria del Popolo church in Rome where Caravaggio's upside down crucifixion of St. Peter has been hanging in the Cerasi Chapel since 1600.


It had been taken down for restoration and was propped up, upside down against a wall under the glare of glaring arc lights. So just our luck, but we did get to see Caravaggio's right way up 'Crucifixion of St Peter.'

Later we went to the Holiest of Holies, the Sistine Chapel in the Vatican, HQ of the Roman Catholic Church and home to Michelangelo's ceiling featuring a central depiction of the Creation of Adam. You'd think that after 500 years it would still be there, and you'd be right, and we were absolutely gobsmacked into silence. Not by the fresco, but by the rubbish on the floor that some knobheads had left. We couldn't believe that anyone could be so thoughtless and disrespectful!


So now, every time I think of the non pristine sistine, instead of

all I remember is this

!