The 19th Century and Contemporary Art Collection is displayed in no less than fifty-five rooms of the Vatican Museums. This Department is overseen by Dr. Micol Forti. The collection, inaugurated by Pope Paul VI in 1973, is comprised of 600 works including paintings, along with sculpture and graphic works of art. These were collected thanks to the generosity of artists, collectors and public and private benefactors. Most of the donations were the outcome of direct contacts with the art world that Pope Paul VI fostered following his meeting with artists in the Sistine Chapel on May 7,1964.

On that occasion, the Pope emphasized the need to re-establish a dialogue between the Church and contemporary art. His hope was that the close and fruitful links of the past could be revived. His desire was also a way of contributing to his ambitious project: the realization of a 20th Century Art Museum in the Vatican collections. The works of art collected by Paul VI, and by his Secretary Monsignor Pasquale Macchi, thus came to enrich the small nucleus of already existing works, which had entered the Vatican Pinacoteca at the time of Pius XII. Over the last few decades, the collection has been further extended with the goal of expanding and completing the existing historical sections.

The Collection is displayed along an area leading from the Apartments of Innocent III, Sixtus V and Alexander VI Borgia to the Sistine Chapel, enabling the visitors to see a representative selection of Italian and international 20th Century art through the works of some 250 artists. It is our hope that, with the generous donations of modern religious works of art, we can continue to expand this important collection.