Raphael
One of his most important papal commissions was the Raphael Cartoons (now in the Victoria and Albert Museum), a series of 10 cartoons, of which seven survive, for tapestries with scenes of the lives of Saint Paul and Saint Peter, for the Sistine Chapel. The cartoons were sent to Brussels to be woven in the workshop of Pier van Aelst. It is possible that Raphael saw the finished series before his death—they were probably completed in 1520. He also designed and painted the "Loggie" at the Vatican, a long thin gallery then open to a courtyard on one side, decorated with Roman-style grottesche. He produced a number of significant altarpieces, including "The Ecstasy of St. Cecilia" and the "Sistine Madonna". His last work, on which he was working up to his death, was a large "Transfiguration", which together with "Il Spasimo" shows the direction his art was taking in his final years—more proto-Baroque than Mannerist.
Raphael I Bidawid
On March 21, 1989 Raphael I Bidawid was elected Patriarch of Babylon, head of the Chaldean Catholic Church. His election was confirmed by Pope John Paul II in June 1989. During his Patriarchate, Patriarch Bidawid, in agreement with the Chaldean Synod, established The Pontifical Babel College for Philosophy and Theology in 1991. The Babel College is situated in Baghdad, Dora, El-Mekaniek, next to St. Peter Chaldean Seminary. The Babel College became an instrumental educational institution for the Chaldean Church. Patriarch Bidawid could speak 13 languages. He died in Beirut, Lebanon on July 7, 2003, at the age of 81.