Saint Peter, Very Rare Vatican Manufactured Tapestry ... First Half Of The Eighteenth Century.

Saint Peter, very rare Vatican-made Tapestry ... first half of the 18th century .. 77 X 63 cm 97x 82 cm with the old Salvator Rosa model frame gilded with gold spangles The work was born from a drawing by the Roman painter Giuseppe Bartolomeo Chiari produced under the supervision: FERLONI, Pietro. - The contact details of this upholsterer, active in Rome since 1717, when he was appointed director of the papal manufacture of S. Michele, founded in 1710 by the will of Pope Clement XI, are not known. He was a member of the Congregation of Virtuosos of the Pantheon and in 1725 he was appointed by Pope Benedict XIII minor palatine officer in charge, as director of S. Michele, of the custody of the tapestries belonging to the Vatican. The project of forming a state tapestry, pursued by various popes: Giulio II della Rovere, Leo X, Clement VII Medici and Paul IV Carafa until Urban VIII was only realized with Clement XI Albani. He was responsible for the founding of the only tapestry shop in the Pontifical State which, assuming the sign of San Michele Arcangelo as a trademark, develops an ideological program in line with the institutional and educational line, which had transformed San Michele into a seat of schools. professional and artistic. The tapestry, manufacturer of marketable and quality aesthetic products, acquires greater autonomy than other schools. Linked to the commission of the popes, who depend directly on salaried workers unlike other workers active in the hospice, the tapestry follows stylistic and iconographic choices which depend on the pontiff's need to use the tapestries as a gift to foreign delegations or legations. papal. Sent abroad. In addition, at the end of the 18th century, the reproduction of antique tapestries began, to avoid their deterioration with frequent exposure in liturgical ceremonies. The extraordinary success of the products of the Tapestry led France, under the occupation, to close the factory to eliminate competition from the Parisian production of the Gobelins.