Description
From the Vatican Museum website:
The frescoes that we are contemplating here introduce us into the world of the contents of the Revelation. The truths of our faith speak to us here from all sides. From them human genius took its inspiration undertaking to clothe them in forms of incomparable beauty. With these words pronounced in the Homily during the Holy Mass celebrated on 8 April 1994, on the occasion of the completion of the restoration of the Last Judgement, the Holy Father John Paul II wished to place emphasis on the sacredness of the place in which the paintings, like the images of a book, serve to render the truths expressed in the Holy Scriptures more understandable.
The Vatican Museum has created a virtual tour of the Sistine Chapel.
Accessibility Information
From the Vatican Museums website:
The Vatican Museums offer free entry to all disabled visitors with certified invalidity of more than 74%. For visitors who are not self-sufficient, free entry is also extended to a companion.
This type of visit cannot be booked online: the free entry tickets are issued upon presentation of a certificate of invalidity at the Special Permits and/or Reception desks in the hall of the Museums.
Disabled visitors and, if appropriate, a companion, are guaranteed priority skip the line entry (without the need to queue).General accessibility features:- Assistance animal welcome
Mobility accessibility features:- Wheelchair hire available
- Accessible toilet
Mobility Information:From the Vatican Museums website:
To hire a wheelchair, it is necessary to present a valid identity document and deposit.
The Museums are accessible also to visitors on mobility scooters and with electric wheelchairs. However, due to space limitations, access or use are not permitted in some museum areas.
In this case, the visitor will be invited to transfer to a traditional wheelchair, which may be hired free of charge in the entrance hall.Toilets specially equipped for the disabled are located along the itinerary and at all dining and refreshments points. To rapidly view the locations of washrooms, visitors are advised to consult the Vatican Museums Map.
Most of the museum spaces are accessible to people with motor disabilities.
To facilitate the visit, the Vatican Museums advise an visit itinerary without barriers which, thanks to assistance from the Guard Corps, will enable visitors to easily reach the main services and places of interest.On account of their standardised itineraries, guided tours proposed and organised by the Vatican Museums are not open to visitors in wheelchairs. The sole exception at present is the tour "Vatican Gardens without barriers", which proposes a guided tour along an ad hoc route accessible also to visitors with mobility difficulties or in wheelchairs.
Vision accessibility features:- Audible or braille signage
Vision Information:From the Vatican Museum website:
For easier and more extensive access to their artistic patrimony, the Vatican Museums offer blind and partially sighted visitors a free service of tactile and multi-sensory tours. They are offered the opportunity to explore casts and a broad selection of sculptures and original works exposed in the Pinacoteca of the Vatican, the Gregoriano Profano Museum, the Gregorian Egyptian Museumand the Ethnological Museum, as well as the Vatican Gardens.
The intention is to enable also the blind and partially sighted to get to know, ichnographically, some of the masterpieces of the Vatican collections with the aid of thermoformed panels and prospective bas-reliefs, produced for the purpose with captions in Braille and/or in large characters.Phases of the tour
Syncretic and analytical reading of the works through the use of thermoformed panels and prospective bas reliefs produced ad hoc. Followed by a simulation of the visual/perspective experience to analyse compositional, technical, plastic and chromatic effects.
Listening to poetry and musical pieces which, along with analogue and synaesthetic references (acoustic, olfactory, tactile, etc.) produced by the didactic guides, will evoke the images represented in the work, favouring the passage from a simple knowledge to a deeper perception.
Thanks to the perfect reproductions produced by expert restorers, it will be possible to touch a fragment of the mosaic with the detail of the aureola of Melozzo’s Angel, or a part of the canvas with a detail of the shroud of Caravaggio’s Deposition.
N.B. Guide dogs for the blind may enter provided they are kept on a lead and wear a muzzle. To facilitate access and assistance, visitors wishing to bring their guide dog are requested to inform the Museums several days in advance at accoglienza.musei@scv.va.
Hearing accessibility features:- Sign language assistance or interpretation services
Hearing Information:From the Vatican Museums website:
In order to overcome any barrier or discrimination in the enjoyment of the artistic and cultural heritage accessible to visitors, the Vatican Museums have for some time opened their doors to deaf and hard of hearing visitors, offering a free service of guided tours in Italian Sign Language (LIS).
The tour, which offers three different itineraries, is guided by deaf educational workers selected by the Vatican Museums through an innovative professional training and employment project.Itineraries
Raphael’s Rooms and Sistine Chapel (2h)
Discovering the masterpieces of Raphael and Michelangelo in the Vatican Apostolic Palaces.
Pio Clementino Museum and the Sistine Chapel (2h)
A journey through painting and sculpture, from masterpieces of classical statuary to the fifteenth- and sixteenth-century works of the Sistine Chapel.
Vatican Gardens (2h)
An evocative journey through the historical, botanical and architectural treasures of the Vatican Gardens.Days of visit
Wednesday (from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m.), Saturday (from 9.30 a.m. to 11.30 a.m.; from 12 p.m. to 2 p.m.; from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m.); Friday (Evening Openings).The Pope’s Museums also welcome oralist deaf people who do not use or do not understand Sign Language, and instead use lip-reading only. They are offered, again by prior reservation, the possibility of discovering the papal collections, free of charge, accompanied by a specialised educator.
An innovative video guide in American Sign Language (ASL), supplements and completes the options offered by the Vatican Museums for deaf or hard of hearing visitors. Distributed free of chargeat the Antenna International desk (Courtyard of the Cuirasses), the video guide in ASL accompanies the visitor on a fascinating tour of the main Vatican masterpieces: from the splendid statue of the Apoxyomenos to the Laocoön Group, from the Apollo to the Torso of the Belvedere, from the Gallery of the Tapestries to the Gallery of Maps, from the Apartment of St. Pius V to the Sobieski Room. The Raphael’s Rooms and the Sistine Chapel are also included in the guided tour.
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