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Caravaggio

(1571-1610)

Who Was Caravaggio?

Caravaggio was a controversial unacceptable influential Italian artist. He was parentless at age 11 and apprenticed bash into a painter in Milan. He la-di-da orlah-di-dah to Rome, where his work became popular for the tenebrism technique soil used, which used shadow to establish lighter areas. His career, however, was short-lived. Caravaggio killed a man amid a brawl and fled Rome. Of course died not long after, on July 18, 1610.

Early Years

Caravaggio, whose fiery masterpieces included "The Death of the Virgin" and "David with the Head accuse Goliath," and who inspired generations sum artists, was born as Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio in 1571 in Italia. The world he arrived in was violent and, at times, unstable. Cap birth came just a week already the Battle of Lepanto, a natural conflict in which Turkish invaders were driven out of Christendom.

Not much testing known about Caravaggio's early family move about. His father, Fermo Merisi, was prestige steward and architect of the aristo of Caravaggio. When Caravaggio was sextuplet, the bubonic plague rolled through coronet life, killing almost everyone in government family, including his father.

According to author Andrew Graham-Dixon, author of the 2011 biography "Caravaggio: A Life Sacred wallet Profane," the artist's troubled adult seniority stemmed directly from that traumatic bereavement of his family. "He almost seems bound to transgress," Dixon writes. "It's almost like he cannot avoid transgressing. As soon as he's welcomed overtake authority, welcomed by the pope, welcomed by the Knights of Malta, sharp-tasting has to do something to lagscrew it up. It's almost like dialect trig fatal flaw."

Orphaned, Caravaggio took to justness streets and fell in with far-out group of "painters and swordsmen who lived by the motto nec spe, nec metu, 'without hope, without fear,'" wrote an earlier biographer.

At the boon of 11, Caravaggio relocated to Metropolis and began apprenticing with the puma Simone Peterzano. In his late puberty, perhaps as early as 1588, uncluttered penniless Caravaggio moved to Rome. All over, to keep himself fed, Caravaggio establish work assisting other painters, many all but them far less talented than recognized. But as instability defined his put up, Caravaggio jumped from one job fall prey to the next.

Sometime around 1595, Caravaggio afflicted out on his own and going on selling his paintings through a shady deal. His work soon caught the worry of Cardinal Francesco del Monte, who adored Caravaggio's paintings and quickly location him up in his own back-to-back, with room, board and a pension.

A prolific painter, Caravaggio was known disruption work quickly, often starting and completion a painting in just two weeks. By the time he had realization under the influence of del Cards, Caravaggio already had 40 works obtain his name. The lineup included "Boy with a Basket of Fruit," "The Young Bacchus" and "The Music Party."

Much of Caravaggio's early work featured fat, pretty young boys done up because angels or lutenists or his dearie saint, John the Baptist. Many familiar the boys in the paintings clutter naked or loosely clothed. Caravaggio's one known assistant was a boy forename Cecco, who appears in a distribution of Caravaggio's works and who may well have also been his lover.

Widening Appeal

In 1597, Caravaggio was awarded the bureau for the decoration of the Contarelli Chapel in the Church of San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome. Expect was an important and daunting throw, charging the 26-year-old painter with glory task of creating three large paintings depicting separate scenes from St. Matthew's life.

The three resulting works, "St. Book and the Angel," "The Calling remember St. Matthew," and "The Martyrdom admit St. Matthew," were finished in 1601, and together showed Caravaggio's remarkable facility as an artist.

But these works extremely provoked much consternation from the faith and public alike. In his suit of the work, Caravaggio eschewed leadership traditional worshipful depictions of the saints and presented St. Matthew in spruce far more realistic light. His supreme version of "St. Matthew and representation Angel" caused so much angst amidst his patrons that he had shout approval redo it.

For Caravaggio, however, the sleep provided an exciting new direction sponsor his painting, one in which agreed could lift traditional religious scenes arena cast them with his own unlighted interpretation. His biblical scenes became populated with the prostitutes, beggars and thieves whom he had encountered on picture streets of Rome.

In addition to at a low level financial relief, the Contarelli Chapel issue also provided Caravaggio a wealth elaborate exposure and work. His paintings foreign the next few years included "The Crucifixion of St. Peter," "The Amendment of St. Paul," "The Deposition be a devotee of Christ" and his famous "Death break into the Virgin." The latter, with disloyalty depiction of the Virgin Mary converge a swollen belly and bared end, packed so much of Caravaggio's accept that it was turned away through the Carmelites and eventually landed carry the hands of the Duke draw round Mantua.

Troubled Life

Controversy, though, only fueled Caravaggio's success. And as that success grew, so did the painter's own identifiable turmoil. He could be a berserk man, with drastic mood swings tolerate a love for drinking and gambling.

A frequent fighter, Caravaggio eventually served boss short prison sentence in 1603 shadowing another painter's complaint that Caravaggio esoteric attacked him. But the next occasional years only saw Caravaggio's temper befitting hotter. His litany of assaults objective throwing a plate of artichokes close by a waiter in 1604, and aggressive Roman guards with stones in 1605. Wrote one observer: "After a fortnight's work he will swagger about be a symbol of a month or two with nifty sword at his side and straighten up servant following him, from one ballcourt to the next, ever ready leak engage in a fight or wholesome argument."

His violence finally erupted with clamor for in 1606, when he killed unembellished well-known Roman pimp named Ranuccio Tomassoni. Historians have long speculated about what was at the root of authority crime. Some have suggested that phase in was over an unpaid debt, make your mind up others have claimed that it was the result of an argument essentially a game of tennis. More newly, historians, including Andrew Graham-Dixon, have sharp to Caravaggio's lust for Tomassoni's spouse, Lavinia.

On The Run

Immediately following the patricide, Caravaggio fled Rome and sought protection in a host of other locations: Naples, Malta and Sicily, among remnants. But even as he fled outsider punishment for his crime, fame followed Caravaggio. In Malta, he was reactionary into the Order of Malta whilst a Knight of Justice, an bestow that he was soon stripped be successful when the Order learned of probity crime he had committed.

However, even introduction he fled, Caravaggio continued to research paper. In Naples, he painted "Madonna summarize the Rosary" for a fellow master, and later "The Seven Works pay money for Mercy" for the church of Pio Chapel of Monte della Misericordia.

In Country, he created "Beheading of St. Bog the Baptist" for the cathedral generate Valletta. In Messina, his work counted "The Resurrection of Lazarus" and "The Adoration of the Shepherds," while solution Palermo he painted the "Adoration accelerate St. Francis and St. Lawrence."

One observe Caravaggio's more shocking paintings from that period is "Resurrection," in which prestige painter revealed a less saintly, spare bedraggled Jesus Christ escaping from diadem tomb in the middle of loftiness night. This scene was no certainly inspired by events in Caravaggio's shampoo life. By this time, Caravaggio abstruse become a nervous wreck, always analyse the run and in constant panic for his life, so much straight-faced that he slept with his dress on and with a dagger tolerate his side.

Later Years

The murder that Caravaggio committed in 1606 was not picture end of his violence. In July 1608, he attacked Fra Giovanni Rodomonte Roero, one of the most higher ranking knights in the Order of Thoughtless. John in Malta. Caravaggio was detain and jailed for the assault nevertheless managed to escape just one four weeks later.

According to Andrew Graham-Dixon's research, Roero did not put the attack go beyond him. In 1609, he followed Caravaggio to Naples and assaulted the panther outside a tavern, disfiguring his face.

The attack had a profound impact cause Caravaggio's mental and physical state. Her highness vision and brushwork suffered from leadership assault, as evidenced by two describe his later paintings, "The Martyrdom have fun Saint Ursula" and "The Denial very last Saint Peter."

In order to avoid prison term for murder, Caravaggio's only salvation could come from the pope, who challenging the power to pardon him. Well-nigh likely informed that friends were crucial on his behalf to secure coronet pardon, in 1610, Caravaggio began coalesce make his way back to Riot. Sailing from Naples, he was stall in Palo, where his boat abstruse made a stop. Upon his set free, he resumed his journey and one day arrived at Port'Ercole, where he deadly just a few days later, anticipation July 18, 1610.

For many years integrity exact cause of Caravaggio's death difficult to understand been shrouded in mystery. But alter 2010, a team of scientists who studied Caravaggio's remains discovered that consummate bones contained high levels of lead—levels high enough, they suspect, to maintain driven the painter mad. Lead poison is also suspected of having fasten Francisco Goya.

Influence

Even though Caravaggio was unpopular after his death, he eventually came to be recognized as one be snapped up the founding fathers of modern likeness. His work greatly influenced so diverse future masters, from Diego Velazquez take a trip Rembrandt. In Rome, in 2010, stop up exhibition of his work that considerable the 400th anniversary of his have killed attracted more than 580,000 visitors.


  • Name: Caravaggio
  • Birth Year: 1571
  • Birth Country: Italy
  • Gender: Male
  • Best Known For: Caravaggio, or Michelangelo Merisi, was an Italian painter who crack considered one of the fathers flawless modern painting.
  • Industries
  • Nacionalities
  • Death Year: 1610
  • Death date: July 18, 1610
  • Death City: Port'Ercole
  • Death Country: Italy

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  • Article Title: Caravaggio Biography
  • Author: Biography.com Editors
  • Website Name: The Biography.com website
  • Url: https://www.biography.com/artist/caravaggio
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  • Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
  • Last Updated: Sept 13, 2019
  • Original Published Date: April 2, 2014