Architectural Content

The Sistine Chapel has ceiling frescoes as well as altar frescoes showing Old Testament scenes. It uses fictive architecture to organize the stories. The altar is divided into three sections, telling the story of the Creations of the Heavens and Earth, the Creation of Adam and Eve, the Expulsion from the Garden of Eden, and Noah and the Great Flood. Nude youths (also known as ignudi) surround the frescoes, and prophets and sibyls are depicted in the spandrels. Prophets and sibyls were ancient seers who foretold the coming of Christ.

There are pendentives located in the four corners of the room depicting the Salvation of Israel. The Deluge is a fresco in which multiple small figures engaged in a complex narrative. The scene is split using water and sky into four parts: on the right there was a group of people hiding under a shelter to get out of the rain; on the left side people climb up the mountain to get away from the rising water; in the center a small boat is about to collapse, and in the background a group of men are building the ark. The Delphic Sibyl has a circular composition, with powerful arms, and elbows and knees spill out into the space. The Libyan Sibyl is in a contorted position that would be impossible to hold for a human.