Papal conclave following the death of Pope Alessandro VII, with an iconographic map of Vatican City and scenes of the funeral, procession, and election of the new pope

Papal conclave following the death of Pope Alessandro VII, with an iconographic map of Vatican City and scenes of the funeral, procession, and election of the new pope

Giovanni Giacomo De Rossi

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Conclave prints, circulated at the death of a pope, began to appear in Rome in the 16th century. The purpose of a conclave print was to reveal the secret and mysterious ritual surrounding the election of a new pope. With carefully compartmented scenes showing the funerary rites, a map of Vatican City, and the election including a list of names of the voting cardinals; conclave prints became popular among tourists to Rome. The timeframe in which these prints were rushed to the market paired with the unchanging rituals meant that many of the images could be repeated from one conclave to the next. For a similar print illustrating the conclave following the death of Pope Clement IX, see: British Museum 1987,0113.204. (Information from: Evelyn Lincoln, "Publishing, Secrecy and Curiosity in a German Conclave Print," Art in Print 2, Number 4 (November-December, 2012).

Drawings and Prints

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Papal conclave following the death of Pope Alessandro VII, with an iconographic map of Vatican City and scenes of the funeral, procession, and election of the new popePapal conclave following the death of Pope Alessandro VII, with an iconographic map of Vatican City and scenes of the funeral, procession, and election of the new popePapal conclave following the death of Pope Alessandro VII, with an iconographic map of Vatican City and scenes of the funeral, procession, and election of the new popePapal conclave following the death of Pope Alessandro VII, with an iconographic map of Vatican City and scenes of the funeral, procession, and election of the new popePapal conclave following the death of Pope Alessandro VII, with an iconographic map of Vatican City and scenes of the funeral, procession, and election of the new pope

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.