Central London’s liveliest new show doesn’t involve a Hollywood star roaming West End stages or a glitzy, blockbuster premiere in Leicester Square. Instead, somewhat surprisingly, there is a dark room in the National Gallery containing two paintings.
I was there on Thursday and couldn’t believe my eyes as queues snaked down the stairs from Room One in Trafalgar Square, while high visual-sports staff were on hand to control the crowds (well, keeping the queue orderly – this is the National Gallery after all).
The last Caravaggio is proving to be the most popular small-scale exhibition in this room since Van Gogh’s two Sunflower paintings hung side by side there a decade ago. Of course, it helps that the exhibition is free, but it also shows the power of the Italian old master to capture the imagination of visitors.
The gallery’s own Caravaggio painting, Salome Accepting the Head of John the Baptist, and the Martyrdom of St. Ursula, which came from Italy for the first time in 20 years, are on display in the exhibition; It caused a similar frenzy at the National Gallery.
Although the artist became an overnight celebrity in his time, gallery director Gabriele Finaldi told me that this renewed embrace of Caravaggio is relatively new (in terms of art history) because scholarship brought another perspective in the 1950s.
So why are so many people interested in his work, nearly four centuries after his death?
First, there is the unquestionable quality and eye-catching nature of the images; The bloody scenes we are immersed in – this is close-quarters violence – and the raw emotion they show.
There’s a bold way to put these scenes together. Stand in front of St. Ursula (good luck getting a punchline; sharpen your elbows) and you’ll notice the painter has dropped you right in the middle of the action. You are not a spectator, you are complicit in the outrage that has just occurred. It is instantaneous, emotional.
His style was also revolutionary at the time; The use of darkness and light (impress your friends with the technical term chiaroscuro) made these figures move closer towards you, only increasing the drama that ensued. It’s hard not to be taken back when you see the severed head of John the Baptist being pushed towards you in the gallery’s own painting.
The works feel very modern. They are brave, using real people with dirty faces, torn clothes, broken nails, instead of the idealized stage depictions that were once so common. “It was completely revolutionary and not without criticism. People were shocked by it,” National Gallery curator Francesca Whitlum-Cooper told me at the exhibition’s press conference earlier in the week. “There was a lot of moral panic.”
Centuries before movies existed, Caravaggio had a director’s eye for framing and action, which kept him relevant. He has been praised by big names like Martin Scorsese, who once wrote, “He would make a great filmmaker, there’s no doubt about that,” adding that his work influenced Mean Streets and Taxi Driver.
“The paintings are very cinematic,” Whitlum-Cooper told me. “They’re in your body and you’re right in front of them, there’s an intimacy and impact – he obviously didn’t know cinema – but it speaks to how we look at things. It draws you in. You are in it too.”
Beyond that, Caravaggio had a terrible past, which, for better or worse, always burnishes his reputation. He was the archetype of the bad boy artist. The National Gallery’s website talks about how he acted cool with a sword, “always ready to engage in a fight or an argument… Caravaggio was arrested several times for, among other things, cutting off a rival’s cloak and throwing a plate of artichokes at a waiter.” , injured a guard and mistreated the police.”
In fact, his life could easily justify an ostentatious prestige drama. One day he took things too far and killed his opponent in a sword fight. He was forced to flee Rome, first to Malta, then Naples, and even then there were many examples of his anger getting the better of him – at one stage he was permanently disfigured in a fight. He was pardoned by Rome, but on the way back he was mistakenly arrested, released, but died of malaria before he could return.
The Whitlum-Cooper story “read like a movie script,” he says. Violence and everything else. Caravaggio has an almost tragic flaw; “He can’t let anything good happen, he would do too much harm to himself.” To connect with his contemporary here, there is something Shakespearean about his story.
Speaking of prestige drama, Caravaggio is at the cutting edge in this field; has greatly influenced the lavish new adaptation of Ripley, starring Andrew Scott, which arrived on Netflix earlier this month. There are almost constant references to the works in the exhibition, there are parallels with the artist’s life story, there are influences on how the film was shot, and in one episode the artist even makes a surprise appearance on stage3.
In fact, Whitlum-Cooper said a lot of people asked her about it and she had to watch the show. Before doing so, I asked why Caravaggio was still so popular. “It changed the world and continues to do so today,” he replied.
The hottest (free) ticket in town was painted in 1610 and continues to inspire crowds today; But waiters hope artichokes will be left off the menu at the National Gallery cafe.
The last Caravaggio is at the National Gallery until July 21; nationalgallery.org.uk