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The enigma of "Madonna of the Rosary" by Caravaggio

Thursday, April 24th 6:30pm, San Domenico Maggiore Convent

 

introduction by
Nino Daniele

with the participation of
Bruno Fermariello
Fabrizio Vona
Renato Parascandolo

 
In 1607 spring Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio painted in Naples, for an unknown client, a large painting for the devotion of the Virgin of the Rosary. Everything in this picture seems geared to meet the approval of the bishop and, consequently, that of his patron. Yet, surprisingly, the painting is rejected, and put up for sale. Later, on the advice of Rubens, the work was purchased by a group of painters and is now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Gemäldegalerie in Vienna
Four hundred years after, "Madonna of the Rosary" continues to be an enigma for historians.
For which altar was it painted? Who was the buyer? Why was refused and put up for sale just a few days after its execution? But most importantly, who was the mysterious character in the ruff that appears in the picture? All questions that remain unanswered if a new clue, a trace, that did not allow the identification of the "Madonna of the Rosary", hints and allusions to a dark episode in the history of Naples - never before seen in relation to the artist - whose protagonists were the monks of the convent of the Dominicans of Naples.
These questions are at the center of a debate where there will be interventions by Fabrizio Vona, Superintendent of museums in Naples, Renato Parascandolo, creator and curator of "Impossible Exhibition of Leonardo, Raphael and Caravaggio" and the artist Bruno Fermariello, the "art detective " that will present the suggestive hypothesis according to which the origin and fate of Caravaggio's masterpiece would be tied to a dark episode in the history of the Neapolitan time.
The event will take place at San Domenico Maggiore Convent, where it will be possible to appreciate 117 reproductions of famous paintings and frescoes of the three great artists: among them there will be the "madonna of the Rosary".
The "Impossible Exhibition", patronage of the President of the Republic and promoted by Rai, by the Department for Culture of the City of Naples and by the cultural Polo Pietrasanta.

 

For more information: www.polopietrasanta.it
 
  
 

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1571 Milan - 1610 Porto Ercole) was an Italian Baroque painter born in or near Milan. As a youth, he trained under Simone Peterzano in Milan before moving to Rome in 1592. He soon gained the attention of Cardinal Francesco Maria del Monte, who was one of Caravaggio's most powerful patrons. Caravaggio quickly became one of Rome's most sought-after artists.  Aside from his art, he was known for his fiery personality and penchant for brawling. He was arrested several times in Rome, and in 1606, he killed Ranuccio Tomassoni. The pope issued a death sentence for Caravaggio, who promptly fled for the Italian south, where he enjoyed great acclaim. He died in 1610 while on his way back to Rome to secure a papal pardon, which he received posthumously.

Madonna of the Rosary

In its huge scale and multi-figured design the grandest of Caravaggio's paintings, this may have been commissioned by the Duke of Modena in 1605 and undertaken in Naples. It was offered to the Duke of Mantua in 1607 and was bought by a consortium of Flemish artists, including Rubens, by whom it was offered to the Dominican church in Antwerp.
The theme is Dominican. St Dominic and his friars spread the devotion of the rosary; and here the Madonna, as Queen of Heaven, issues orders to the saint to her right, who clutches a rosary, and the Dominican St Peter Martyr to her left. Beside St Peter Martyr stands the most famous of Dominican theologians, St Thomas Aquinas.
Madonna, Child and saints form a heavenly triangle concealed from the classically costumed suppliants at the front, who kneel in prayer with arms outstretched to St Dominic, while a donor in modern ruff and doublet eyes the viewer. The column to the left and the curtain overhead add to the formality of the scene. Caravaggio achieves an elaborate ordering and interlocking of forms that heralds the typical Baroque altarpiece.