Once I was a clever boy learning the arts of Oxford... is a quotation from the verses written by Bishop Richard Fleming (c.1385-1431) for his tomb in Lincoln Cathedral. Fleming, the founder of Lincoln College in Oxford, is the subject of my research for a D. Phil., and, like me, a son of the West Riding. I have remarked in the past that I have a deeply meaningful on-going relationship with a dead fifteenth century bishop... it was Fleming who, in effect, enabled me to come to Oxford and to learn its arts, and for that I am immensely grateful.


Wednesday 31 October 2012

Five centuries of the Sistine Chapel ceiling


Today marks the 500th anniversary of the reopening of the Sistine Chapel for worship after Michelangelo completed painting the ceiling when Pope Julius II presided at Vespers there on October 31st 1512.

There is an article about the anniversary here, which has links to other ones about the ceiling and about the issues of managing access to the chapel so as to ensure proper conservation of the frescoes. This is clearly a continuing debate about which I have posted before.


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