All language subtitles for Caravaggio.2025.720p.WEBRip.x264.AAC-[YTS.BZ]_Leoz

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If you were to die tomorrow,
how would you be remembered?

What have you done
that has any significance?

Will God welcome you to heaven?

Did you do him justice?

He tested the hell out of me.

He gave me hands
that can create great beauty

yet cursed me with a deep anger.

A murderous anger.

And now my enemies
have multiplied in the dark.

These wounds are
testament to that.

Idiot! Wow.

Look at me.

Hiding like a sewer rat

on a boat sailing to a city that

once embraced
me as the greatest,

exalted me like those of old:

Michelangelo, Raphael, da Vinci.

My paintings, my passion,

set on the highest altar
an artist can desire.

They loved me.

And now they condemn me.

Those snakes of Rome.

But I was good at
playing their game.

The best.

So why have they deserted me?

I know that forgiveness
has been promised

and I trust it will be honoured.

But I will, on bended knee
and bearing gifts,

return to my rightful place
as their master of light.

I hate all this snivelling
and grovelling to Papal power,

but I can't be a
fugitive forever.

I need redemption.
I need sanctuary.

For there are many that seek my
head on a platter... literally.

I know what it is
to paint mortality.

To tell a story of human drama,
of violence and betrayal.

Of life and death.

And yes, I may die tomorrow,

made to disappear,
never to be seen again.

My fate is in the
hands of others.

So, I ask...

who will remember my name
when mortality strikes me down?

Will my art be my saviour?

Who will tell my story?

Caravaggio was
born in Milan in 1571.

Now, Milan was a tragic city

through the suffering from
plague, famine, warfare,

through the years
of Caravaggio's childhood.

The life of Caravaggio and
the art of Caravaggio overlap.

It's not possible
to understand Caravaggio's art

if you don't
understand his life.

You understand Caravaggio's life
by looking at his works.

The darkness of Caravaggio's art

and the sort of sense
that he is an abandoned man,

proud, satirical, difficult,
not easy to get on with,

and it's been
suggested this goes back

to Caravaggio's very stormy
and tragic childhood.

Making was in my blood.

I remember, as a child in Milan,

hearing the sound of my
father's hammer carving stone.

The workshop filled with a fine

dust floating in
shafts of light.

His virtuous toil only matched
by a deep religious conviction.

But like most of Europe,

Milan was going through
a period of tribulation.

The city was
riddled with plague.

People everywhere suffering,
starving,

breathing in that deadly stench.

A purgatory of souls.

Darkness descended
on our little world

while the devil
took his revenge.

God knows how I survived.

We fled to my grandfather's
house in nearby Caravaggio,

in search of shelter
from the horrors.

But darkness
haunted the doors of

many a house in
Caravaggio too...

including my own.

His father and his grandfather

die in the plague
on the same day.

And his mother, Lucia Arattori,

is left with a whole
family of small

children to look
after and bring up.

In 1584, Caravaggio's mother
put a large sum of money

into buying Caravaggio
an apprenticeship

in Milan with Simone Peterzano.

Peterzano thought that he was,

signed himself
as, a pupil of Titian.

So, he brought to Milan
some knowledge of Venetian art

which I think was important
to Caravaggio.

My brain was buzzing with
theories, pictorial designs,

how to mix colours,

oils, frescos,
drawings, observing

nature, and painting life.

After mother died,

I had to wait two years
for my meagre inheritance.

Two years!

But when it came through,
I was out of there.

Out of Caravaggio, out of Milan,

rushing towards my destiny
as a great artist,

in the city I most desired...

Rome.

When Caravaggio arrives in Rome
from Lombardy,

it seems that he first painted
copies of devotional works.

This is the lowest job you could
get as an artist starting out.

And he did that in exchange
for room and board.

Then he's said to have painted
heads, three heads a day.

I mean, real sort of hack work.

And then he painted what
was called half-length figures.

You don't get a
sense of permanence.

You don't get a sense
of progression either.

You get the impression he's

jumping from
workshop to workshop.

Rome was tricky at first.

I remember the cramped
conditions and meagre meals

offered at my lodgings
with Pucci, the priest.

We used to call
him Monsignor Salad

because that's all
you got to eat at night!

But every artist needed
a patron in Rome.

You worked the streets, selling
your efforts for a poor return,

while your stomach ached.

Rome in the 1590s was in
a process of transformation.

After the Sack of Rome,
its population had dwindled.

The monuments that had made it
so glorious

were covered with
weeds and grass.

And all travellers going to Rome
in the 16th century

comment on the atmosphere
of desolation and poverty.

First of all, there was a
vast building programme

instigated by the energetic
building pope, Sixtus V,

who wanted to turn Rome
into a symbol

of the centre of Christianity.

It has the Papal Court,
which is at the centre.

And circulating
around this court

are the courts of
the great nobles,

the courts of the ambassadors,
the courts of the cardinals.

And all these are sources
of artistic patronage.

But then a stroke of luck.

Old man Cesari offered me a

position in his
workshop. Brilliant!

He was a prominent artist
who was well connected.

Pope Clement VIII, who
loved him, knighted him,

and gave him the name
Cavaliere d'Arpino.

His studio was like oxygen,

but Cesari was all baby-blue
heavens, pillowy clouds,

airy ascensions
accompanied by cherubs

and choirs of attractive angels.

He had me working on decorative

motifs for his
church commissions.

When he moved
into Cesari's studio,

he was following
a well-worn path

that had happened
in the Renaissance.

I mean, artists went
into artists' studios

and they mixed paints,
they created pigments.

And slowly they'd
be given more to do.

I think in Caravaggio's case,
as you see,

there's still life with fruit,
baskets of fruit,

then those still
lives with fruit

become still lives
with beautiful young men.

Two, three
figures, four figures,

five figures, more virtuosity.

Michelangelo, Raphael, Titian.

I so wanted to be like them,

to be revered by popes,
commissioned by popes,

revel in my connection with God,
directly through my painting.

Remembered and adored.

I was beginning to attract the

attention of some
influential folk.

Like Cardinal Francesco
Maria del Monte,

collector of the new, supporter

of youth and with
the Pope's ear.

Cardinal del Monte is a key
early supporter of Caravaggio's,

and I think
Caravaggio really owes

his turn in his
fortunes to Del Monte.

And led to his patronage
and also lodgings in his palace.

This was really key,

that Caravaggio finally had a

wealthy patron
looking out for him.

The fact that he was painting
these unusual subjects

of musicians, fortune tellers,
gipsies,

everyday subjects, that
he elevated and gave status,

almost like they
were history painting.

Caravaggio was truly innovative.

Everything in his painting
drags you into that space.

I think personally,
that he also knew his market

and they were going to end up

in the private boudoirs
of cardinals and princes,

and they're of
young, beautiful men.

I think in the Sick Bacchus,
we see a self-portrait,

and it's an
extraordinary painting

because it's a
painting of illness.

It's a painting, probably of him
in his early twenties,

probably suffering from malaria,

and at that time malaria was
known as the Roman disease.

It was thought that you got
malaria by staying out too late,

and if anybody stayed out
too late, it was Caravaggio.

But it's also a painting about

the fact that
everything changes.

It decays, fruit decays.

The grape contains bloom.

If you taste it, you'll have
that dry, acidic taste

of the sweetness of the grape.

And he's holding the grapes as
though he's about to crush them.

He doesn't just
do a sick Bacchus,

he does a beautiful Bacchus

with the reflections in
the glass and the wine.

But it's almost like
he has to do a sick Bacchus

as a counterpoint
to the beautiful Bacchus

as a warning for the ills of

drinking wine and
eating raw flesh,

which was what you did
in the bacchanalia.

It would seem that he always

lived a fairly solitary life,
a bohemian life.

He frequented
the various taverns.

He went around with a sword.

He liked to party.

As far as family is concerned,

he never married
and had no children.

Some documents reveal that
he did have lovers though.

These are quite
sporadic testimonies

but they certainly suggest

he had lovers
both female and male.

Boy Bitten by Lizard is one of
Caravaggio's key early works,

painted in Rome
in the mid-1590s.

And it shows a
boy in half length

with this beautiful still life
beside him.

And he is shown in a kind of
dramatic moment of pain.

There's a lizard tenaciously
clinging to his finger

and he's recoiling in pain, but
it's a very enigmatic picture.

A lot has been written
about what it means.

Is it an allegory,
perhaps an allegory of touch?

Is it a warning of the perils
lurking behind beautiful things?

The lizard was clearly hidden
amongst the fruit.

The picture is very sensual.

There is a sensuality
to a lot of these

early pictures of
half-length boys

and there's something sort of

effeminate about the
rose behind the ear

and this has often been seen

as an interpretation
of Caravaggio's own sexuality

but we have to remember he's not

painting these
pictures for himself,

we think he's painting them
for the open market.

And he often gives more
prominence to the still life.

The still life is often the most

accomplished part
of these pictures.

We have to remember Caravaggio's
own words, were that, you know,

painting still life required as

much artistry as
painting figures.

And this was a really
revolutionary thing to say.

In the, kind of,
genre hierarchy,

still life is really
at the bottom.

"Spogliando modelli
e alzando lumi."

So, undressing models,
so, painting people from life

and lifting or enhancing
the light effects.

These are the two
most revolutionary

aspects of Caravaggio's art.

Interesting, the way
the world can turn.

The look of horror
as you lose your head.

The way a face
contorts in a convex mirror.

Here is Medusa,

feared for her ability to turn
men into stone with a glance.

The hideous Gorgon with her
headdress of living serpents.

I'll tell you what a bit
of talent can earn you.

Food, board, steady work

and the occasional introduction
to some very rich people.

What's not to like?

Rome has an extremely dark side.

It is a city that is intensely
skewed towards the male.

And to satisfy the needs
of this male population

there's a huge
prostitute population.

And they're confined to a part
of Rome called the Ortaccio,

that is "the evil garden".

And beside the
prostitutes, there's

a huge population of the poor,

of the dispossessed, of beggars,

of soldiers fighting,
rowdiness in the streets.

I got drunk on danger.

Taverns, whores, tricksters,
thieves and lots of brawls.

I gave off with my
knuckles if needs

be, or with the flash
of blade on flesh.

Honour and respect
is all you have

in the shadows of
the Campo Marzio.

Arrogant youth, cheats, wayward
souls and the grifting bravi.

Caravaggio reproduced
on the canvas

an image he knew well,

an image of a tavern,

of players playing cards,

of players cheating at cards

The important thing is
that this painting represents

the condemnation
of the card game

which depicts a young man
being cheated by the cardsharps.

And he shows all this
with the typical light

of his early artistic years.

In those early years,
Caravaggio made very colourful,

very bright paintings.

I'm not stupid.

I knew my choice of models

offended some of our
holy brothers in the Church.

But my models were my friends,

available and willing
for a bit of coin.

Like Mario Minniti, for example.

He was a pretty boy,
I painted him a lot.

And then there was
my vivacious little Fillide.

She'd do anything for money.

A queen amongst the whores
and villains of the Ortaccio.

Fillide was hardly a virgin
and never a saint,

but she made a great Catherine.

Her raw beauty still haunts me.

Now, Saint Catherine
was of noble descent,

a virgin martyr,

and she's usually represented
as an enchanting looking figure

with her eyes cast heavenwards.

Instead of this, Caravaggio
paints this young Roman woman

who looks very directly
at the spectator.

A kind of ambiguity
that is completely

new in representations
of holy figures.

These wonderful draperies in
dark violet and midnight blue.

Hovering beside her
is this astonishing sword.

And the sword
is Caravaggio's duelling rapier.

And the bottom of it
seems tinged with blood.

Though I think, in fact,

it's the reflection of the red
from the cushion in the sword.

But the sword is
sort of hovering there.

And Caravaggio's arranged
Saint Catherine's hands.

They're sort of
long and elegant,

as though they're not quite
holding the sword,

and I think it does
give the picture

a strange, sexual,
erotic tension,

this deadly rapier
in the centre,

Saint Catherine's hands

and this Roman woman
looking out so directly.

Now here he is in
the city of Raphael,

the city of Michelangelo,
and he doesn't draw.

He paints directly
from the life model.

But it's the first time that

Caravaggio has
used these life studies

to create a dramatic
historical story.

So, it is really a big
turning point in his art.

Of course, I also gave Fillide

the starring role
as Judith beheading Holofernes.

Hm. She loved it!

That look!

Oh, I remember that scowl.

She could cut you with a glance,

though the slice of a sword
was much more effective

when it came to beheading
Assyrian generals.

Dressed to impress
and catching the

eye of any man
who might see her,

she played the rich
and beautiful heroine so well.

This general,
Holofernes, was beguiled

into a drunken stupor by Judith

who then approached his bed.

She took hold of his hair and
slashed twice across his neck.

Her maid was on
standby to bundle

their gory trophy into a sack.

The act of violence,
brought into

focus by the horror on his face,

painted at the
exact point of death.

Deliberate on my part.

His last thought
in all its bloody reality.

Took hours to get the angle
of that head right.

The chance to
convey truth, rare.

Profound, unblinking visions
of painful truth, rare.

The wealthy can buy chapels
to pave their way to heaven,

but the artist can
wield his brush

to venerate his
pathway with truth.

At last!

I got my chance when
the French Cardinal Cointerel

bought a side chapel
inside San Luigi dei Francesi.

It's a spectacularly beautiful
and awe-inspiring church

that I used to
visit all the time

when I started living
in the Piazza Madama.

Del Monte shoved me forward and
I got my first major commission.

My first series of paintings
with multiple figures.

My first stab at real dramatic
truth. The Contarelli Chapel.

Not one, but three
large paintings.

The subject,
biblical, of course.

St Matthew, the
tax collector one.

Story done to death,
but who cares?

Most people can't
read the Bible anyway.

They have to witness the story
in all its pictorial glory.

And no one had witnessed before
what I produced.

With malachite,
bone black, red lake,

lead white, vermilion,
and yellow ochre,

all mixed with walnut oil,

I created magical alchemy!

The first thing that happens
when you enter the church

and you see the
Contarelli Chapel,

you have this amazing
dynamic explosion of colour.

The scale and the grandeur of

these things
outstrips everything.

And then on top of that,

you've got this
really, really intelligent way

of constructing
the three stories.

He'd painted fortune tellers
and card sharps,

but he'd never done
anything like this.

So, it was a big gamble,
with a lot resting on it,

but the French needed this
church painted by the year 1600,

because it was the Jubileo.

The public unveiling of those

pictures in 1600
caused a sensation.

But you have to remember,
until this point,

Caravaggio's paintings
have not been accessible.

They've been inside
people's homes, in palazzi,

only to a very small few
they'd been accessible.

So, suddenly, for the
wider artistic community

this is their first chance to

see what Caravaggio's
capable of.

And we know artists
flocked to Rome to see them,

that Caravaggio received
the most exaggerated praise.

They were jealous.
He was suddenly

the most famous artist in Rome,

going from being
relatively unknown

to being a sort of superstar.

In a gloomy chapel
lit mostly by candles,

I harnessed the darkness
with a single shaft of light.

Sunlight. Our light.

God's blazing orb.

"And Jesus saw a
man called Matthew

at his seat in the customs house

and said to him, 'Follow me, '

and Matthew rose
and followed him."

It's just an
astonishing painting.

There's no perspective like
in the Renaissance.

And all the figures on the left
seem to be responding.

And there's that lovely moment
where Matthew points at himself

saying, "What, I?"

And then Christ's hand comes out
in this wonderful gesture,

which is a direct copy
of the Sistine Chapel,

this finger pointing
towards Matthew.

And the two guys, either
side of him, the spadas,

these kind of hired,
glamorous thugs,

one's about to
leap off, thinking

that Christ
threatened his master,

and the other one's pulling back
with the light hitting him,

thinking, what's going on?

And the light goes
across Christ's head,

and just picks out
a slight sliver of a halo.

It's absolute genius.

What Caravaggio introduces there

is a new kind of narrative
where the actions, the gestures,

the expressions are ambiguous.
You can't always decipher them.

I think his contemporaries
would have enjoyed this

in the same way that we do.

Like us, they would have

wondered, which
figure is Matthew?

Is Matthew actually about to get

up and follow
Christ, or is he not?

Is the figure at the end of the
table meant to be the young man

who could not
throw his riches aside

and pass through
the needle's eye?

Now, he did introduce a new kind
of inward turned expression,

a new language of gesture,

that has the, sort of,
fleeting ambiguities

that would have interested
contemporary observers.

Caravaggio's light
is a particular light.

It clearly has various meanings.

It represents precisely the
light that illuminates the scene

in a theatrical way,

but it also represents
the light of God, who redeems.

And light is Caravaggio's ally.

Caravaggio embraced
light like a friend.

Light allowed him
to remove the dark,

to eliminate the dark,

to show the things
that happen in the dark.

The dark is like a presence
that he felt inside him.

He knew he was a great artist,
but also a great sinner.

The shadow and the darkness
increasingly dominate the light.

In the darkness,
recoiling on the floor

and pierced by a shaft
of divine illumination,

we see the apostle Matthew,

a former tax collector,

whose calling has redeemed him
from the dark abyss of sin

and guided him
on a righteous path.

The King of Ethiopia
lusted after Matthew's niece

but Matthew rebuked him,

because she was a
bride of Christ, a nun.

So, the king sent a soldier
to kill Matthew for the offense.

He was slayed
and left humiliated,

alone in his martyrdom,

surrounded by a crowd
of passive onlookers...

including me.

I made sure I was present,
a witness to the act.

No one was rushing
to save Matthew,

but I believe my empathy
is plain to see.

A discerning
observer of morality,

the human condition, and faith.

All delivered with
consummate skill.

He includes
himself partly to say,

this is the world
that I have made,

this is realistic painting, and
what an astonishing artist I am.

And I think no
painter who didn't

feel the sort of power of sin,

of possible damnation, of guilt,
could have painted these works.

And I think also,
on a very simple level,

that no artist who didn't have

a genuine religious response
to the Bible

could have painted them
with such emotion for humankind,

and I think, above all, perhaps,
in Caravaggio's paintings,

with such a feeling for the idea

that Christ came for the poor
and for the dispossessed.

In the same year I painted
the Martyrdom of Matthew,

I watched a heretic friar
called Bruno burn at the stake.

What a spectacle!

Like Copernicus,
Bruno had declared

that the Earth circled the Sun,

which was bad enough.

What was worse was his
denial of the Virgin Mary.

His denial of the divine Christ,
his denial of eternal damnation.

What a madman!

Just goes to show,
one word from the Pope

can damn a blasphemous friar...

or a wayward artist.

You've got these
three paintings.

The one you're first facing
is Saint Matthew and the angel,

where the angel recounts
the gospel to Saint Matthew.

It has this amazing
moment in it,

which I love in the whole cycle.

Just on the edge
of the painting,

Matthew's teetering on a stool,

and the stool just edges off
the front of the painting,

and it's that gesture you do
when somebody says

you've got to get this down.

You've got to write this
down, quick. Write this down.

And the angel's
up top recounting

all the things he
needs to put in.

He picks up the first thing,
a stool and it's tottering,

like an urgency.

Saint Matthew's
got to get this gospel

down while the
angels are recounting it.

That's the first
amazing thing you see.

The other formal aspect which
has a great impact on the work

is that the stool is falling
towards the spectator.

It is as if the Church
and the message of the Church

was literally falling into
the laps of the faithful

thus strengthening the religion
of the Catholic Church.

The congregation participates

more directly in this story
of Saint Matthew.

In my opinion, that's what
Caravaggio wanted to convey.

The saint, and
therefore the Church,

engaging and
involving the viewer.

When it comes
to his religious paintings,

you do have to know a little bit
about the Catholic Reformation,

what it wanted from
a religious artist,

what a religious painter
was actually allowed to do.

The desire to
transform the Church

and to free the Church
of what people saw as corruption

and as false practises,

was initiated by the Catholics.

And this is why I tend to use
the term Catholic Reformation

rather than Counter-Reformation,

because the desire
to reform the Church

begins, really,
before the Protestants.

This was a very prudish time,

nudity in churches
is entirely forbidden.

And the Catholic Church
wanted an art that is dramatic,

that is emotional,
that appeals to the spectator.

One of the great
Catholic Reformation

theorists, Cardinal Pagliotti,

says how much more moving it is
to see a virgin die

than to read about it in a book.

So, they are looking for an art
that'll be really in your face.

And, of course,
Caravaggio gives them that,

although they don't always
like it when they get it.

After the success
at the Contarelli chapel,

I got asked to do a similar

commission for Santa
Maria del Popolo,

to paint the Apostles of Rome,
Saints Peter and Paul,

whose martyrdoms symbolised the
rebirth of Roman Catholicism,

so rooted in their blood.

Another wealthy patron, Tiberio
Cerasi, paid for the commission

and wanted the most
advanced artists in Rome,

so, naturally, he chose me.

And the more established
Annibale Carracci.

The paintings in Santa
Maria del Popolo in the chapel

are two of the first paintings
I saw of Caravaggio in situ.

And they flank a painting
by Carracci of the Madonna,

which when you look at it,

immediately, it looks
chocolatey boxy, it looks sweet.

These were contemporaries.

And then you cast your eyes
left and right,

and on the left you have
Saint Peter being martyred.

He's being pushed
up on this cross

by these brutish figures who
are straining to push him up.

And as he looks down,

this old man's face looking
at these nails going through,

it's kind of controversial

because he's not meant to
be looking at pain or suffering.

He's meant to be
entering heaven.

He knows this is the moment
of his martyrdom.

He's chosen to be
martyred upside down.

But there's this
reality in his face.

How do you do
that in a painting?

My workmen, with blackened feet,
twisted in the darkness,

their faces hidden,
their bodies taut,

veins swollen as they strained
to complete the task.

Peter looks old,

but I thought he needed
to appear strong, muscular,

able to resist gravity and raise

his head to those
who will listen.

I was in awe of his sacrifice.

A religious moment, brutally
performed by brutal men.

One of Caravaggio's trademarks
is the chiaroscuro lighting,

this very kind of forceful,

contrasted, light
and dark effect

that he brings to his pictures.

And light plays
such a key role in

carrying you around
these paintings.

In the Crucifixion
of Saint Peter,

it's the thing that picks out
each brutish execution.

I mean, this whole picture
is about martyrdom,

but it's actually about
the, kind of, physical effort.

They're pulling and
heaving and pushing

and the light picks up
on Peter's own face,

which is ridden with fear.
He looks terrified.

But he doesn't just use light
for dramatic effect.

The lighting always has
a underlying meaning,

whether it's a kind of divine
light, the light of revelation,

the light of conversion.

And what you realise
Caravaggio has

done, he's pared
the whole thing back.

These figures sort of emerge
from darkness.

For my Paul, time had stopped.

Although he had been
violently flung from his horse,

a delicate light
illuminated his face

as his open arms
betrayed an ecstasy.

The light is not
blinding but enters

Paul's soul like a
powerful epiphany.

I wanted his stillness
to become our

witness to a moment
of conversion.

A sudden and
complete transformation.

No longer an old man,

I decided to cast him
as a young, common soldier.

His confused groom holds the
reigns of a magnificent horse,

a working horse, bare back,

in reverse and
delicately hovering,

as if from another reality.

He came along at a time

when the Catholic Church,
certainly, was fighting.

They were fighting back
against the new Protestantism.

One of things
they talk about is,

how can we make these stories

more viable to
the ordinary people

and one of things they talked
about was spectacle and theatre

and I think Caravaggio
gives them that in spades

with these new images, these
new ideas, these new orders.

And he was right
at the centre of all that.

My competitors called me

quarrelsome,
volatile and paranoid.

Look, you will
die on the streets

of Rome if you don't have steel.

I wasn't just bending the rules,

I was burning the rule book.

I will always defend my honour,
with blunt force, if necessary,

that's just me.

The sword is only
one of my weapons.

My brush is the other.

And with that I have status
and loyalty beyond the streets,

with the lofty
indulgence of patrons.

The commissions flowed
with a series of smaller works

that attracted great attention.

The first was Christ at Emmaus.

Two disciples journeyed
to Emmaus from Jerusalem,

depressed and disheartened after

witnessing the
crucifixion of Christ.

As they travelled,
Jesus drew near and joined them,

but was not recognised by them.

The inn keeper
serves them supper

while Jesus discusses scripture.

According to Luke, "Jesus took
bread, blessed it and broke it,

and gave it to them.

Their eyes were instantly
opened, and they recognised him.

But then he
vanished out of sight.

The disciples returned to
Jerusalem to tell the others

that they had witnessed
the resurrection of Christ."

The Supper at Emmaus
is painted in 1601

for the Mattei brothers, a
wealthy banking family in Rome,

and Caravaggio's still living
in Del Monte's palace,

under Del Monte's protection,

but he is able to work
for other wealthy patrons.

And there's a space
at this table for us.

There's a way to draw you in.

This basket of fruit
on the edge of the table,

that's sort of falling
into our space,

as is also the jutting elbow
of the disciple on the left

who's leaping out of his chair.

These are invading our space.

And this is one of the key
things with Caravaggio.

We're not just passive viewers.

We become active participants
in his pictures.

So, the innkeeper is standing
passively beside them.

He's the only one who seems

completely unmoved
by what's going on.

And if you see, he's the only
one with his face in shadow.

He hasn't seen the light.
He's completely in the dark.

He doesn't recognise Christ
for who he is.

And then Caravaggio
plays with his shadow.

Behind the head of Christ,

you have a sort of counter halo

created by the shadow
of the innkeeper.

It's an incredibly sophisticated
picture,

as well as being technically
really masterful.

So, we have to kind
of control the urge

to push that basket
back on to the table.

We almost feel like
pulling up a chair.

It's something he
does again and again.

He also does it in
his Doubting Thomas,

where you have these three
apostles gathered around Christ,

entirely focused
on this gesture of Thomas

with his groping finger
going into the wound.

And there's a space in this sort
of arc, this human arc, for us,

and we feel that we're sort of
in the picture,

that we're one of the apostles
witnessing this event.

Unless you feel something,
painting is meaningless.

We are flesh and
blood, after all,

and should experience art
with a shiver through the spine.

Search for humanity
and authenticity,

even in those
cursed to damnation.

People like Judas, for example.

A conflicted and
complex villain.

I show Judas
mortified by his clumsy embrace,

with a furrowed
brow, conflicted.

The consequences of his actions

reflected in the look
of disappointment

on Christ's passive face.

It's hard to paint humiliation.

To get all that details right
and still make it relatable,

to patrons, to
ordinary people...

to myself.

The thing most people
misunderstand about Caravaggio

is the fact that most
of the documents

we've got are police records.

He's seen as a kind
of blunt instrument.

Two weeks painting, two months

drinking, two
months of violence.

And I think we have to look much

further than that,
beyond the myth,

that myth,
that violent myth of Caravaggio,

to find the beauty
within the work.

Most people see him
as this kind of thuggish brute

who painted like an animal,
lived like an animal,

but I think there must have been
so much more to him.

He must have had a great

intellect. He must
have read well.

I think his paintings speak
of his intellect

and he must have had something
going for him

if he can be invited
into the papal court

and the aristocracy
of Rome at the time.

I don't think they
would invite somebody

in who didn't have
some level of charm.

In my opinion, the
Victorious Cupid

is the most intellectual
painting that he did.

Painted for
Vincenzo Giustiniani,

and he had other paintings
by Caravaggio.

Now, what the painting shows is

Cupid, who is the
Roman god of love.

And he's holding two arrows,
one black, one red,

to suggest the pains
and the pleasures of love.

And I think a
spectator would have

been really stunned
by this apparition

of this very beautiful,
very erotic young boy.

So, I think that the painting is
really about the triumph of sex.

Love conquers all things.

And it's quite a common theme
in early 17th century painting.

Musical instruments are archaic,
the strings are broken,

they cannot be played, the

writing of the
poet is illegible.

They have a kind
of abandoned air.

But Caravaggio
is the only artist

to show it in this real triumph
of human sexuality.

And I think that this painting
is full of comparisons with art,

with literature,

as well as being a shocking
painting of a 12-year-old boy.

He was an odd personality. I

mean, he was a
lone wolf, as well.

He didn't train students
in how to paint.

He very much worked alone

and he was a revolutionary
in the way that he painted.

And painting figures directly
from life and onto the canvas

was the single
most revolutionary

aspect of Caravaggio's art.

God, this journey is relentless.

My body aches, my arse throbs,
and my stomach churns.

"Not long now," they say...

and then what?

A prodigal return or
a broken promise?

All these thoughts of betrayal
are driving me mad.

And yet, the spectre of my death
haunts my broken sleep.

Am I to be sacrificed
by the fathers of Rome?

Around 1604,

Caravaggio paints for a
church in Rome the Deposition.

You can see how Caravaggio is
clearly inspired by classicism.

This work, at first glance,
almost looks like a sculpture.

We see a Christ
that is truly dead,

that is heavy,
and not just in spirit.

The person who supports him
is struggling

and needs help from another.

They struggle to
support this weight

that is lowered into the grave

like a kind of freight elevator

because there is
that slab of stone

on which they are standing

which seems to be descending
into the grave.

It's both very realistic
and very significant.

Caravaggio is representing here

the important fact,

the human fact of death.

He is making death tangible.

Like others,
the heirs of Ermete Cavalleti

had purchased a side chapel
in the church of Sant'Agostino.

He wanted a picture
of the Virgin of Loreto,

and they needed
a great artist to paint it.

In a Roman doorway, I painted
a young local girl, Lena,

as a beautiful Madonna standing
with her child, a vision,

blessing two pilgrims stripped
of wealth and worldly goods,

their bare and filthy feet,
kneeling in servitude.

The honest labourer
and devoted poor.

The poor will always be
with you, says the Bible.

They're not only abundant,
they're familiar.

Grace, poverty and
piety, walking right

up to the door
of the Holy Virgin.

We have the rich, dark velvet
of Mary coming to the door

to greet these pilgrims
who are in jute and hessian,

with the soles of their feet
thrust out facing us,

with the dirt and
the humus, this

earthiness, thrust
out towards us,

these two pilgrims fixated
by the Madonna

coming to the door
holding the infant Jesus.

And what I love about the Jesus,
the baby Jesus in this painting,

is that he's wriggling
and she's holding him

like you do when babies wriggle.

And he just holds out his hand
in a little gesture

to bless the pilgrims.

I think it's an
extraordinary painting.

Just to the right of the doorway
is a real Caravaggio moment

where the plaster is unrendered

and the brick shows through
this beautiful doorway.

But just to the right,
there's a hint of reality.

But I think it's a
lovely indication

of the fact that
nothing's perfect

in this world of humus
and knees and dirt.

We have to realise that
he's one of the first artists

to bring real people
into paintings.

I mean, he turns bakers
into the aristocracy.

He turns prostitutes
into angels.

He's the first artist
to really put real people

at the heart of his paintings
and the heart of the story.

Everyone has parity.
There isn't a hierarchy.

Throughout the Renaissance,
there's a hierarchy of subjects,

of people, where people
are positioned in a painting.

He places everyone in the
same claustrophobic space.

And the idea that
he takes people

who everybody knew, the baker,

the candlestick maker,

and turns them into a pope
or a disciple or Pontius Pilate,

I think that's the thing
that he does most.

I think it's the fact
that everybody knew

who these characters were,

in a very small milieu
of the Campo Marzio,

everybody knew
who the baker was,

the prostitute, the
barber, the surgeon,

everybody knew who
these people were,

they were their
own kind of locale

and to be inserted
in paintings was

just quite an
extraordinary thing.

To show human grief
using a minimal action,

to create a compelling drama,
is what occupies my mind.

I aim to build up a complex

pattern of gesture
and expression,

of revelation both
melancholic and enlightened,

in an effort to trigger
a deep contemplation.

A revelation. Always
bathed in a dramatic light.

Caravaggio certainly
provoked people.

He certainly
challenged people. His

paintings are very
often outrageous.

And occasionally,
not as often as people make out,

but occasionally,
his paintings do get rejected.

But I don't think they were ever
rejected on doctrinal grounds.

It's usually because
they're indecorous,

because they are shocking,
because they're lascivious.

They never seem to have
had blasphemous intentions.

For instance, The
Death of the Virgin,

which Caravaggio
does for a church

in a working class area of Rome,

it is astonishing
that he thought

they would want that painting,

because he paints
this very, very dead Virgin.

He paints no heavens,
no clouds of angels, nothing,

just a scene of terrible death.

He was shocked
and horrified when

it was rejected by the Church.

So, he is pushing boundaries,
artistically, all the time.

The Death of the Virgin
is an extraordinary work.

It has been called
the most religious

painting of the
seventeenth century.

Caravaggio made this painting
in Rome

just before he had
to flee for his life.

She is clearly a dead woman.

Some have suggested
he modelled her

on a drowned woman
pulled from a river.

The work is extraordinary
because of the set he constructs

and the complex way
he positions all the characters.

One is Mary Magdalene

who is in the foreground
crying desperately.

She is distraught
in the face of death.

She is not shown as happy
that the Virgin Mary has died

and is on her way to heaven.

I believe Caravaggio
has put his mother in that image

as he saw her on her deathbed.

He paints this with love.

So, when the painting was

rejected, it was a
very heavy blow.

This may have contributed to
his agitation that then led him

a few months later to murder.

May, 1606, is a
month I won't forget.

That's when the arrogance of

Ranuccio Tomassoni
blighted my life.

A local enforcer
and arrogant thug,

whose beef with me was...

who knows what!

But we often clashed
and his rage was inconsolable,

mouthing off to anyone
who would listen.

Well, I had had enough.

So me and some friends,
Longhi and Toppa,

organised a fight

to teach him a lesson.

Violence is the
language of the streets

and I was never one
to shy away from a scrap.

So, we marched right past
Tomassoni's house

where he and his lackeys saw us.

We all squared up,

but it was between
me and him, really,

so we went at it, with swords,
one-on-one.

There was lots of
screaming and yelling.

Bit of a shambles, really.

I got cut,

but then Tomassoni
fell to the ground,

bleeding out like a pig.

I was surprised. I
must have nicked him.

Then it all kicked off,
with blades flying about.

Toppa was severely
wounded, as was I.

But what was worse,
Tomassoni died that night.

It wasn't supposed to happen.

The Tomassoni
family are powerful,

so I had to flee
to the Alban hills to hide,

with my old friends,
the Colonnas.

I've been cursed by
that day ever since.

And with a death
sentence hanging

over me like the
sword of Damocles,

I headed for Naples,

ruled by the Spanish,
so out of reach from Papal law.

This place was so full of
people, jostling, hustling.

And the smell!

On the salty air,
there was the sound of markets

thriving with Spanish trade,

whilst Vesuvius rumbled
and percolated in the distance.

This was a city of culture
in a golden age.

The wealthy indulged in luxury
goods, fine horses, and music.

And there were so many churches.
So many opportunities.

Naples is the city
of the New Orders.

It's new found
wealth from the gold

that was plundered
from the New World.

Naples is hell
inhabited by angels.

Or it's heaven
inhabited by devils.

And the term "carpe diem" was

written for Naples,
"seize the day."

And they're building churches
at a rapid rate.

The rich and the
wealthy want in.

It's a port city,
it's a city of banking.

Historically, it had always had

connections with
other areas of Italy.

And was there ever a more
chiaroscuro city than Naples?

A city of contrasts, black and
white, of wealth and poverty.

Caravaggio was
made for Naples and

Naples was made for Caravaggio.

It's like this meeting of
the city and this great artist

had come together
by misadventure, really.

My reputation preceded me.

Celebrated with
commissions immediately.

And the irony was
not lost on me, though.

In Rome, I am considered
a murderous criminal,

condemned to exile.

But in Naples, I am embraced
as a Spanish subject,

protected by my noble friends,
admired by other artists,

and welcomed with open arms.

Caravaggio spent
seven months in Naples

of quite astonishing
productivity.

And his works include
three great altarpieces.

One of them, The
Seven Works of Mercy,

that he painted
for a confraternity,

shows these works,

which are described
in the Gospel of Saint Matthew,

in a frenzied Neapolitan street.

Caravaggio responds so quickly
to Naples itself.

It's the most remarkable work.

The Neapolitans knew all
about the seven acts of mercy

but had never before seen it
as I did it.

One swirling maelstrom of black
showing all the mercies at once.

Feed the hungry,

give drink to the thirsty,

clothe the naked,

shelter the homeless,

visit the sick and
the imprisoned,

bury the dead.

Do all this and you
receive salvation.

The characters
were pure Neapolitan.

People stopped me in the streets
to express their awe and wonder.

I loved that.

The Misericordia
were a fraternity,

and I think with the
Counter-Reformation

came this new kind
of responsibility.

If you had great wealth
or you earned great wealth,

you were meant to
do great good with it.

But this Misericordia
was set up by seven noblemen

in order to provide
hospital care for the poor,

food, and work within the tenets
of Saint Matthew's Gospel,

to be fed, to be
clothed, to be buried,

to be redeemed, to be rescued.

I mean, Caravaggio's genius was
to try to get

the seven acts of mercy
into one painting.

Compositionally,
it's extraordinary.

And all over the painting are,
like, separate light sources.

One of the angels' calves
lit like a spotlight.

The back of the
figure at the front.

And the breasts, on Pero,
who's feeding her father.

It has this wonderful detail.

There must have been
conversations about

but who's the
figure in the back?

Who's that at the front?
What's that there?

But one thing we must remember
about that painting is

that when it was first shown
and when it was painted,

it would have
been by candlelight.

I think, on one level, it's the
greatest painting he ever did.

For me, it's the most
problematic, the most difficult,

the most challenging,
the most intelligent,

and I think he knew it.

My altarpieces
were a hit in Naples.

I never stopped
working and landed

some pretty prestigious
commissions.

The Spanish Viceroy himself
commissioned a picture

of the apostle
Andrew who angered

a Roman proconsul, Aegeus,

by converting his
wife to Christianity.

The punishment?

Crucifixion, what else?

The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew,

which is a strange painting,

a haunting image

and Caravaggio paints his face
and his emaciated body

with an unparalleled
and moving expressiveness.

He puts a little
group of figures

who represent the

poverty-stricken
world of Naples.

And there's a woman at the left
with a goitre

who is one of his most touching
descriptions of poverty,

and it's particularly
southern Italian poverty.

So, in a really remarkable way,
he works very, very fast

and produces a
completely new vision

in his great
Neapolitan altarpieces.

I had to get out of Naples.

Despite so much success,

there were too
many figures lurking

in the shadows for my liking.

I was drawing
too much attention.

Time to leave, further south.

Further into sanctuary.

I pinned my hopes
on the Knights of Malta,

the Order of Saint John,

to save me from
Rome's retribution.

There is something
stoic about Valletta.

This new capital of Malta,
this bastion of Christianity.

An impenetrable fortress,

battle-ready to protect Europe
from infidel aggressors

like Ottoman Turks
and Barbary pirates.

Besides, I knew a
few people there.

Sons of some noble families
who had supported me in Rome,

Giustiniani, and Sforza Colonna.

The Knights' Grand Master, a

Frenchman called
Alof de Wignacourt,

seemed to be a fan.

Wisdom told me
to start with his portrait.

This painting was worth every

bit of the knighthood
I received,

much to the
bewilderment of others.

Wignacourt had
petitioned the pope,

asking to receive two men as

brothers of the
Magistral Knights,

stating, "Even if
one of them had

committed murder
during a brawl."

Hm. I wonder who that could be?

My name was never mentioned, so

Wignacourt's
petition was genius!

I guess he was
keen for me to stay.

I reckon that's why I got to do
my biggest painting yet,

for the Oratory of
the Co-Cathedral

of Saint John in Valletta.

On Herod's birthday, Salome,
the daughter of Herodias,

danced for guests
and pleased Herod so much

that he promised
to give her whatever she asked.

Prompted by her
mother, Salome said,

"Give me, on a platter,
the head of John the Baptist."

The king was conflicted,

but because of
the promise he had

made in front of so many guests,

he ordered the beheading
of John the Baptist,

who he had imprisoned.

The Beheading
of Saint John the Baptist,

he makes some
incredible compositional

choices with that picture.

To me, the thing
that strikes me the

most is just the
starkness of it.

I mean, more than
half of the picture

is given over to
nothing, to a void,

and all the action is happening
in the lower left corner

with John the
Baptist reclining at

the very lower
edge of the canvas.

And when you go
and see this painting

in situ it entirely
dominates the space.

And the space
isn't a side chapel.

It's quite key.

It's where the knights met.

It's a council chamber.

It's where Caravaggio himself
was knighted.

He signs this picture
in the blood "Fra",

showing that he's been knighted.

And it is vast.

I mean, it measures
more than five metres wide.

And you realise why he made
those compositional choices

because your head is closest
to the Saint John.

When you see it in reproduction,
you don't realise,

the picture doesn't hang off the
floor. It hangs at head height.

And so, the figure, the action,

is very close to you
when you stand in the space.

And they're, sort of, spot-lit.

So there's something incredibly
theatrical about this picture.

It's one of the rare occasions,

in fact, if not the
only occasion,

in which Caravaggio signs,

and he signs with the blood
of Saint John the Baptist.

And again, you would have been
able to see that in the space.

It's a very, very
powerful picture.

In fact, he's wearing
a sort of goat fur

and the little feet are placed
very prominently by his head

so it's emphasising that idea
of the sacrificial lamb.

And then the Knights
of Malta turned.

Why do I always find myself
staring down the blade

of some priggish
upstart who offends me?

And, in this case,

why did I pick a fight with a

Knight of the
bloody Justice? Idiot!

Just when things
were going so well.

A knighthood, prospects of a
pardon, brilliant commissions.

Again, I found
myself in a prison cell.

This time behind the walls
of Fort St. Angelo.

For what? The offense
of offending, it seems.

I was not in a good place,
I can tell you.

But I escaped,
on a boat, headed for Sicily.

Syracuse was much like Naples.

Another Spanish viceroy and
land of interesting contrasts.

A new start, I thought,
or, another start, at least.

Essentially I was a criminal
in two states

but artists and men of letters

seem to welcome me with
open arms, wherever I go.

"The best painter alive,"
they say, "and he's here!"

Lucky for me,

the church dedicated
to the city's patron Saint Lucy,

was being renovated

and the government
wanted to commission

a major work of
art for the altar.

In Sicily, Caravaggio began
to paint in a different way.

He sets his scenes
with vast areas

of darkness above the figures.

And I think this is the most

striking stylistic
characteristic

of his Sicilian works.

And they have
a kind of haunting gravity.

He paints, sort of, fragile,
piteous-looking figures

in the foreground.

And they have a strange
new quality of sympathy

for the poor and the
meek and the humble

that differentiates these works
from his earlier periods.

I think that
Caravaggio's biography

is apparent
throughout his works,

and what's very interesting is

that he manages to combine
his own personal situation

with a response
to the needs of his patrons,

and with, I think, a very
dramatic response to place.

In Sicily, there are hints
that he was afraid,

that he felt hunted,
that he slept

with his dagger
beside him in his bed,

and that his spirits,
one writer writes,

were as restless
as the seas of Messina.

His Adoration of the Shepherds,

when you're
standing back from it,

you realise it's a stable scene.

There's the donkey,
there's a loaf of bread,

there's the shepherds
crowded around, the holy child.

And then, as you get closer,

you can see the
straw on the stable

floor, loose straw
on the stable floor.

And as you get
closer to the canvas,

you realise he's
just taken a dry brush

and just dragged it across
the surface of the canvas.

I think he just became
more economical.

As he got older,
as he was on the

run, his palette
becomes much darker,

whether that's reflecting
his mood, his fear.

We know that he started
to feel paranoid.

He was sleeping with a knife
under his bed.

He starts using more burnt
umber, siennas, earth colours.

They say I rant and rave like a
madman, paranoid, deranged!

But I have reason to be.

This dark life is suffocating.

Traitors and
tricksters everywhere!

Licking their sour lips
over my demise.

I was hardly hiding. Hm!

There were knights everywhere.

I was attracting the attention
of some important people,

connected people.

But I never felt I could
stand still for long.

Have to keep moving, out
of the unseen, the unknown.

No, not that way.

That way.

Towards the pale
light that guides me.

Sicily was a safe haven no more.

I could sense the
vultures circling.

Time to head back north

into the arms of Naples
to await my pardon.

But I had only been there a
few days when trouble found me.

Or did I find trouble?

Doesn't matter. It was nasty.

A nasty attack, with blades.

Set upon by some bravi
at the Osteria del Cerriglio.

No reason given.

And I couldn't tell if they
were acting in the name of

the knights or the
Pope or just because

they took offense
to my natural charm.

Some reported that I was
either dead or badly disfigured,

which set tongues
wagging in Rome.

Like a dog licking his wounds,
I laid low.

I must admit that I became a
little obsessed with beheadings.

It was on my mind all the time

and in the narratives that
consumed me, like Salome.

Unable to bear the sight
of what she had ordered,

she looks away
from the lifeless head,

while an old woman
and the executioner

contemplate the
scene with such pity

that they seem to be looking on
with some emotional distance...

the distance between
life and death.

The severed head, a tragic mask.

The picture of Salome with
the head of John the Baptist

dates from the end
of Caravaggio's career.

And you can see just how
different the way it's painted.

Gone is that sort of very

descriptive,
hyper-realistic quality.

The colours are very subdued.
It's almost monochromatic.

Some of the late pictures
have a sort of flash of red

but, generally,
they use quite muted tones.

It's a moment of
great emotional,

physical and psychological
tension in his life.

And I think you really feel that
in his pictures, as well.

Painting the frail cast
of characters, you know,

the old woman
grieving is juxtaposed

with Salome's youthful face,

which has this
very enigmatic expression.

She can't bear to look at the
beheaded John the Baptist.

And what looks like quite a
simple, straightforward picture

is actually very
complex in terms of

the interplay between
the characters.

In these last four
years of his life,

he has a death sentence
hanging over his head.

I personally don't see
Caravaggio's own head

in the head of John the Baptist,

but we know that he did
insert himself in his pictures,

famously in the
David and Goliath,

today at the Villa Borghese.

Read into it what you want,
but that's how I pictured it.

My severed head,
dangling in the dark.

There is no relief in death.

Only torment.

The Martyrdom of Saint Ursula

is a truly exceptional painting
and probably his last.

It is a painting that,

fortunately, we rediscovered
only a few years ago.

The framing
is cinematic or photographic

because what do you see?

You see the archer
killing Saint Ursula

from very close range.

They are almost
touching one another.

He shoots the
arrow, she receives it.

The killer and the one killed.

Caravaggio also puts himself
in the picture,

even if it's unrealistic,
watching this murder,

perhaps as a witness,
perhaps as the victim.

Caravaggio's final journey
definitely started from

the house of Costanza Colonna
in Naples.

He then went to
Palo on the felucca

with several
works of art by him,

which he's intending
to take to Scipioni Borghese.

New evidence has just shown

that the aim of his journey
was to go to Palo,

to meet with Giovanni Francesco
Tomassoni,

to come to peace with him,

and was absolutely essential

before he went to Rome
and received a papal pardon.

It was bitterly ironic that,

as the papal pardon
has been granted

and Caravaggio's making his way
back to Rome,

it's actually the journey
that leads to his death.

And there's some discrepancy
in the early sources

about what exactly happened.

We know that he gets
into trouble, he's in prison,

and when he's released,

the felucca with
his paintings has

disappeared and he's desperate.

These are the
pictures that are going

to get him back
into favour in Rome

and, without them,
he feels really helpless.

It seems he probably died of

fever, heat stroke,
heart attack.

We don't really know.

But what we do know
is he died alone.

Certainly Caravaggio
is a modern painter.

The essence of Caravaggio's art,

the central thing is truth.

Caravaggio was a great painter
when he was alive.

He was then imitated,
praised by young painters

who saw his new way of painting

that broke with the
painting style of the time,

and therefore had
many followers.

Caravaggio has an iconic status,

and I would say on the same rank
as someone like Leonardo.

And I think it is the universal
appeal of his paintings,

the fact that you don't need
to know anything.

You can appreciate them for
their beauty, for their power.

I think he's just such
a brilliant storyteller

and his pictures
are so captivating

that you can come
to them completely

fresh and get
something from them.

I think it's because he speaks
very powerfully and directly

across the centuries
about humankind.

He strips religious art
of its traditional iconography,

goes back to its very meanings.

And I think he introduces an

extraordinary poetry
of light and dark

that still speaks to us
very directly today.

At last!

My pardon from Rome is promised,

so I buy my passage on this
godforsaken boat to take me back

to my rightful place,

lorded and fêted
by my noble friends.

I have had to move
quickly, bringing

canvases to sweeten the deal.

I can't help but feel nervous...

suspicious that all
is not as it seems.

But let's throw caution to the
wind, live off instinct and wit.

Not long now until we land

and, God permit, I can make
my long-anticipated return.

Back to the streets of Rome
and those who love me.

They will rejoice

and shall celebrate the return

of the great Michelangelo
Merisi da Caravaggio!