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Caravaggio (Michelangelo Merisi, known as Caravaggio)
Milan or Caravaggio, 1571-Porto Ercole, 1610
Michelangelo Merisi, son of Fermo Merisi who was in the service of Francesco Sforza Colonna, received his training from Simone Pertezano in Milan, where he is documented in 1584. In 1592 he was in Rome where he attended the studios of Cavaliere d'Arpino and Antiveduto Gramatica. In 1594 he met his first patron, the Cardinal Del Monte. For Del Monte Caravaggio painted, among other works, the Head of Medusa (Uffizi), and the Fortune Teller (Pinacoteca Capitolina). His first important commission was for the canvases with the life of Saint Matthew for the Contarelli Chapel in San Luigi dei Francesi (1599-1600), followed by the paintings for Santa Maria del Popolo (1600-1601). These works, with their novel accentuated realism and use of intense chiaroscuro created a great impression in Roman artistic circles. During this period Caravaggio painted The Burial of Christ (Pinacoteca Vaticana), The Virgin of Loreto (church of St Agostino), the Virgin of the Palafrenieri (Galleria Borghese) and the Death of the Virgin (Louvre). In 1606, following a serious incident in Rome, he fled the city and moved to Naples. In 1607 he is documented in Malta where he painted the Beheading of Saint John the Baptist. Fleeing once again, he moved to Sicily where he remained between 1608 and 1609: from these years date the Raising of Lazarus (Messina) and the Burial of Saint Lucy (Siracusa). In late 1609 he returned to Naples where he died, a victim of malaria, on the beach at Porto Ercole. Caravaggio had no direct pupils but numerous followers who disseminated his style not just in Italy, but throughout the whole of Europe. The echoes of his painting reach as far as the work of artists such as Rembrandt and Velazquez.
FRIEDLäNDER, W.: Estudios sobre Caravaggio.Madrid, 1982 (English edition, 1955).
MARANGONI, M.: Il Caravaggio. Florence, 1922.
MARINI, M.: Caravaggio. Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio "pictor praestantissimus". Rome, 1989.
NICOLSON, B.: The International Caravaggesque Movement. List of Pictures by Caravaggio and his Followers throughout Europe from 1590 to 1650. Oxford, 1979.
SCHUDT, L.: Caravaggio. Vienna, 1942.
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