Cathedram S. Petri in interiore templi fronte...Plate 41 from the Album 'Basilica di S. Pietro in Vaticano'

François Spierre

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Frontal view of the Cathedra Petri in the Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome, as designed by Gian Lorenzo Bernini and installed in the basilica in 1666.

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Department’s vast collection of works on paper comprises approximately 21,000 drawings, 1.2 million prints, and 12,000 illustrated books created in Europe and the Americas from about 1400 to the present day. Since its foundation in 1916, the Department has been committed to collecting a wide range of works on paper, which includes both pieces that are incredibly rare and lauded for their aesthetic appeal, as well as material that is more popular, functional, and ephemeral. The broad scope of the department’s collecting encourages questions of connoisseurship as well as those pertaining to function and context, and demonstrates the vital role that prints, drawings, and illustrated books have played throughout history.

Metropolitan Museum of Art