Sistine Chapel

NO PHOTO's Please... says a Japanese company in 1999 because they own all copyrite of photos taken of the Sistine Chapel for 20 years due to them paying for the restoration. Obviously people took pictures anyway... the bad part was some didn't turn off their flash. I guess the flash actually ages and damages the walls. A lot of my photo's are dark because our flash was off.

Frescoes! Amazing work. Michelangelo's early frescoes work to his last pieces, it is amazing the growth and change. It went from a opaque color, with not to much shading (that looked amazing BTW) to amazing translucent shades and three dimensional flowing forms. Our guide kept telling us "remember, Michelangelo was a sculptor forced to be a painter."

The 9 stories of Genesis are depicted on the ceiling. Some of the more famous of the paintings are of course the creation of Adam, banishment from the Garden of Eden, and Noah and the flood.
Next you see the Last Judgment behind Brian's head. It was so fun to hear all the stories behind some of the faces of these paintings. For instance how Michelangelo would get ticked off at someone and soon you their face would be portrayed on one of the demons and a snake would be biting their private parts.

I felt like the bad guy on goonies when they are questioning the chubby kid and he tells all the horrid things he has done and the bad guys says "hey mom, I beginning to really like this kid."

After exiting the Sistine Chapel we were able to peek through a key hole and see the Pope's living quarters. Well we saw the Swiss Guards, anyway while I was peeking I turned and said "someone is coming" Sure enough one of the guards opened the door. I thought we were in trouble and wanted to take a picture "like we were trying to do through the keyhole," but didn't think fast enough and the Guard in his silly uniform let out a janitor and then closed and locked the door.

TOO BAD!