Caravaggio

“It is a work made by a painter that can paint well, but of a dark spirit, and who has been for a lot of time, far from God and from His adoration and from any good thought.”

So said a contemporary churchman of Caravaggio and his painting of the Madonna.

Best-sellers have been written about this artist in our own time, and his cult sprang up not long after his untimely death in 1610. Over the course of the seventeenth century, his techniques and “tricks” influenced a host of Western artists, from Spain to the Netherlands. Velázquez, Rembrandt, Artemisia Gentileschi… they were all Caravaggists in one way or another. It all came down to the treatment of light. The early renaissance artists had understood the dramatic potential of light and shade, but Caravaggio took this to a whole new level, with tenebrism – a heightened contrast of light and dark, which makes every moment and gesture pregnant with dramatic meaning.

And in his life as in his art, drama was never far away from this violent, turbulent artist. Let’s go on the run with him – all the way from Rome to Malta, via Naples and Sicily. Fortunately, he left plenty of paintings in his wake.

No preparation or reading is required.

No exams, no homework - just entertaining, informative, and accessible learning for pleasure.

You can join us 'live' via Zoom and/or watch recordings of the lectures on demand.

Delivery:

A 5-hour lecture-based course, delivered via 2 x 2½-hour sessions on consecutive Saturdays:

Saturday 4 October, 10:30-13:00, UK time

Saturday 11 October, 10:30-13:00, UK time

The course will be delivered via 2 live Zoom sessions, and include opportunity for questions and discussion.

Recordings of the lecture elements of each session (with discussion elements edited out for GDPR reasons) will also be available – posted within 48 hours of each session, and available on demand for 2 weeks thereafter.