Gallery of Sistine Chapel ceiling book of models for other artists ever since. Along the centre of the ceiling are nine scenes depicting the Story of Creation, the Downfall of Humanity and the Story of Noah as told in the Book of Genesis. The Prophets of Israel and the Sibyls of the pagan world foretold the coming of the Messiah. Both have been included by Michelangelo as a sign that the Messiah (Jesus Christ) was to come not just for the Jews but also for the Gentiles (non-Jewish people). The four corner pendentives show violent episodes in which the People of Israel were rescued from
Illusionistic ceiling painting sotto in sù". This was the prototype of illusionistic ceiling painting that was to become an important element of Italian baroque. Correggio at Parma took the illusionistic ceiling a step farther in his frescoes of Christ and the Apostles for the cupola at the San Giovanni Evangelista and in the "Assumption of the Virgin" in the dome of the Cathedral of Parma, which is Correggio's most famous work (1520–24); in these frescos Correggio treats the entire surface as the vast and frameless vault of heaven in which the figures float. In a visual continuity between the architectural interior and its