The Diary Game 08/11/2021 - Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio. The Mysteries Hidden in His Masterpieces II.

The possible eroticism inspired by the painting, this musical pleasure proved by the painter in the early years were also related to the suspicion of homosexuality and the fact that the young man portrayed here has an open shirt, showing his bare chest, plus the somewhat lascivious look became as many arguments. It is quite clear that the model is the same Mario, probably Caravaggio's lover, a face he carries with him in so many paintings.

Cardinal Del Monte, who was a kind of patron of the young painter, would have claimed neither more nor less, that this face actually suggests the figure of Jesus accepting the sacrifice, offering his bare chest. But Caravaggio will prove a real preference for the male nude by painting religious themes. And perhaps this was not necessarily a reason for accusation, but the sensuality of the treatment, as in St. John the Baptist.

The first, from 1598 (Museo Tesoro Catedralicio in Toledo), also called John in the desert, is debatable as paternity. It is signed by a disciple of Caravaggio, Bartolomeo Cavarozzi, hence the doubts. It is not excluded that the painting was still painted by the master, as some researchers claim, although the chromatics seem significantly different.

However, the resemblance of the face to those in Caravaggio's previous paintings remains striking, which will be fully observed in the two variants of St. John the Baptist (Young Man with a Ram) from 1602, both in Rome.

There is no doubt about it here and the treatment of the biblical figure was, of course, scandalous at the time. It is difficult to accept, regarding this painting with two almost identical variants, the notion of religious feeling, as it is difficult to accept it regarding other paintings, famous, of the painter. Rather, the same jubilee is glimpsed in the chiaroscuro of Victorious Love, for St. John the Baptist is rather a conventional Cupid in relation to the biblical subject. However, the body of the young man on the same red curtain remains, which we see in so many other paintings with a religious theme.

Cardinal Del Monte would have advised Caravaggio to approach biblical subjects and to marry, precisely to prevent scandalous rumors and to come to light, in a way, abandoning the troubled life he was leading in Rome, in quarrels. and beat in the sordid pubs he frequented. How long this advice has been followed is hard to say, especially since the events of these years prove exactly the opposite.

After 1597, Caravaggio painted his large paintings with religious themes. Thanks to Cardinal Del Monte, he received orders for paintings in the churches of San Luigi dei Francesi (Contarelli Chapel) and Santa Maria del Popolo (Cerasi Chapel) in Rome. These are the five great scenes that amaze with the originality of the composition and that constitute a true triumph of the chiaroscuro technique.

The first three, dedicated to St. Matthew (Martyrdom of St. Matthew, 1599–1600, Conversion of St. Matthew, 1599–1600, and St. Matthew and the Angel, 1602, San Luigi dei Francesi); the others, the Crucifixion of St. Peter and the Conversion of St. Paul (both 1600–1601, Santa Maria del Popolo), large canvases, real revolutions in the treatment of themes.

The conversion of St. Matthew seems to be an ordinary pub scene, with gambling on money. In St. Matthew and the Angel, the angel is the same obsessive Cupid and the saint is caught moving, in that twisted position so dear to the painter. The angel is not missing from Martyrdom either, one of Caravaggio's most studied compositions regarding the movement of the characters and the composition of the groups, with the same naked body of a man in the center of the canvas.

The crucifixion of St. Peter has an explosive drama, the only one perhaps closer to the tension and importance of the moment, in an extraordinary composition through the dynamics and the expression of the main character's face. In the other painting in the Cerasi Chapel in Santa Maria del Popolo, the biblical subject is treated in a bizarre manner.

The conversion does not take place on the road to Damascus, but simply into a dark stable, the center of the picture being the huge horse under which St. Paul collapsed, in a military suit. A stallion from the shadows is the only witness to a scene, after all, terrible. Such liberties, which intrigued the ecclesiastical authorities, however, give the measure of the originality of this nonconformist spirit, no doubt a genius painter.