Caravaggio in Naples

Who was Caravaggio? Even Naples knows who he was because of the permanence of one the most important painter of the 17th century.The one who gave humanity to the works the most beautiful of all time.Caravaggio spent the final years of his carreer roaming between Naples,Syracuse, Messina and Palermo.He died in 1610 at Porto Ercole for malaria and tragically never found out that the Pope had already granted him a long awaited pardon for a homicide..... it shold have  happened in the dark and narrow lane of Rome, .Three canvasses are kept permanently in Naples-the renowned 'Flaggellation'in San Domenico Maggiore;The wonderful canvas ' Works of Mrercy' kept at the Pio monte della Misericordia ,and for the first time the 'Martyrdom of Saint Ursula' in Palazzo Zavalos.In the artist's last four years of continuos and experimentation,he forged a new way of painting which was dramatically realistic.He represented religious stories (impartially faithful to the biblical text) as though they were contemporary events,highlighting the drama with flashes of sinister light in the gloomy and impenetrable darkness.Shadows, hands,eyes, strong whites,are opened before the astonished eyes of the' visitatore' who find out all the simple things that the 'antihero', the man of every time ,caught in his privacy , manipulates.The figures are ,besides, seen in a single moment,in a moment of tragic existence,of maximum physical and psychic tension,and of great dignity and real humanity. We feel invited to assist to a miraculous event, in a collettiveand individual drama , to partecipate in the scene,while a few details- a skilfully foreshortened hand, a basket of fruit that seems to be balanced on the edge of the table-seem almost to project out from the surface of the canvas and enter the space of the visitator.Even the Angels , above the canvas 'Work of Mercy'has got special wings that seem to be not celestial but grey, dark ,bird fashioned ......so real to let us thinking to be a  little birds -angel!The Pio Monte della Misericordiais house nearby the Cathedral of Naples.The Istitution was founded in 1610 for the liberation of the slaves,aid to the poor and pilgrims,and assistance  the infirm and prisoners.A group of noble people decided to found the house for the poor ,above all to put order in the lanes of the old city of Naples ,that was full of poverty.It was one of the biggest charitable institutions of the city.In the offices of the Pio Monte della Misericordia, on the floor above ,there is the collection of canvases by Stanzione,Fracanzano and Giordano, and a series of sketches by Francesco De Mura. Naples has been very proud to give hospitality to such impotant artists but even of the deep sense of the history that the memory has left through the century.Isn't it so?!People visiting Naples share the sense of the message,the history wanted to leave.Caravaggio wanted to leave a message so human ,and so real that the Church didn't agree so much ,because the religious element was overclassed by human element so cutting ,so stark, so disturbing to the serious morality of the church.  marina de martino

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