The Tapestry of The Blinding of Elymas features a man enthroned at center, watching on as an altercation takes place in the foreground: two men stand before the king, one pointing at the other, as a group of onlookers gathers in the background. It is a mirror-image of one of the seven large Raffaello Sanzio cartoons for tapestries belonging to the British Royal Collection, but it has been on loan to the Victoria and Albert Museum in London since 1865.

Designed by the High Renaissance painter Raphael in 1515–16, these cartoons depict scenes from the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles. They are the only surviving members of a set of ten designs commissioned by Pope Leo X intended to decorate the lateral lower walls of the Sistine Chapel which are still hung below Michelangelo's famous ceiling on special occasions.

Elymas was a Jewish magician who appears in the New Testament in Chapter 13 of the Acts of the Apostles. Acts of the Apostlescalls him a magus,which the King James Bible translates as "sorcerer." He is represented opposite Paul of Tarsus and Barnabas in the city of Paphos on Cyprus, when the Roman Proconsul Sergius Paulus wishes to hear Paul and Barnabas speak about Jesus. Because of his opposition, Paul states that God made him temporarily unable to see as a cloud of darkness immediately begins to block his sight. Subsequently, Sergius Paulus converts to Christianity.

The tapestry is composed of two distinct sections: the upper portion is original, having survived to the Sack of Rome of 1527, and the lower part is made of a grass extract base, a reproduction of the missing original piece. The original lower portion, destroyed by a fire during the Sack of Rome, was later duplicated on a faux tapestry fabric during its restoration by Silvio Grossi in 1930-1931. He decided to reproduce the missing part of the tapestry on a grass-based support so that a complete read of the artwork would be possible. A brown gimp was put into the split between the tapestry and the painted fabric to maintain the integrity of the work.

The original portion of the tapestry presents several visible missing and worn threads. Previous restorations, for both the alteration of the color and the type of restoration, prevent an accurate reading of the artwork.

The tapestry is lined with bands. The lower portion is in fair condition, but this area also exhibits worn fibers. The item appears as a unified work as it is composed by two distinct parts: tapestry and grass canvas. The artwork must be treated separately, in two parts, to accomodate the material dichotomy.

• Photographic and graphic documentation
• Removal of the cover
• Documentation of previous interventions
• Removal of incoherent deposits with microaspirator.
• Study of the fibers to determine their conservation status as well as to identify the original colors of the fiber threads and the grass-based portion
• Removal of previous restorations
• Separation between the upper and lower parts
• Cleaning and washing preparation: application and repair of synthetic tulle on the back and heat-sealed mesh on the front to avoid further deterioration of the fabric
• Immersion cleaning in deionised water and non-ionic surface cleaner
• Dyeing of spun yarns and textiles
• Conservative intervention and restoration using alternate stitching and decorations of matching colour support
• Cleaning of the fabric
• Dyeing of filaments and fabrics
• Reintegration of the tears
• Reunion of the two portions, replacing the gimp affixed by Grossi in the original position.
• Application of Velcro for suspension