A first look at the V&A’s newly digitised designs for tapestries of the Acts of the Apostles commissioned by Pope Leo X for the Sistine Chapel

“Access” is the watchword of modern arts policy: the principle that everyone should be able to enjoy the arts. But it’s certainly not a new idea: one of its earliest champions was Prince Albert.

It was back in 1853 that the Prince Consort embarked on a pet project he hoped would give the public unprecedented access to the art of the masters, illustrating their artistic development and creative processes through comprehensive collections of reproductions of their work. He began with his favourite painter, Raphael, an ideal starting point as the Royal Collection includes an exceptional group of the artist’s drawings and a vast number of prints. More importantly, it boasts the largest and most spectacular cycle of Raphael images not frescoed on to walls: the seven surviving Cartoons of the Acts of the Apostles, commissioned in 1513 by Pope Leo X as tapestry designs for Sistine Chapel.