The Brumidi Corridors are the vaulted, ornately decorated corridors on the first floor of the Senate wing in the United States Capitol.
They are named for Constantino Brumidi, who designed the murals, although assistants and other artists are responsible for many of the details. Brumidi was an Italian artist of Greek descent who was born in Rome in 1805, worked for three years in the Vatican under Pope Gregory XVI, and served several as an artist for palaces and villas, including the prince Torlonia. Brumidi emigrated to the United States in 1852, and, after proving his skill in frescos 1855, he spent much of the next 25 years until his death in 1880 working in the Capitol, painting the frieze of American history and The Apotheosis of Washington in the Rotunda as well as the Brumidi Corridors.
The Brumidi Corridors were part of the new wing constructed under Architect of the Capitol Thomas U. Walter between 1852 and 1859. Brumidi began making designs for the corridors in 1856. The decorative painting of the walls and ceilings of the main corridors was carried out primarily between 1857 and 1859. Brumidi added details in the 1860s and frescoed the lunettes over the doorways in the 1870s. Although Walter had envisioned plain-colored walls hung with oil paintings, Captain Montgomery C. Meigs, Superintendent of Construction, directed Brumidi to carry out an elaborate decorative scheme based on Raphael's Loggia in the Vatican. Brumidi's classical training in Rome gave him a thorough understanding of ancient Roman, Renaissance, and Baroque styles, symbols, and techniques of wall painting.