Palermo

The painting was completed by Italian painter Caravaggio in Rome in 1600 and later moved to Palermo. It was believed to have been painted in Sicily, one year before he died. It depicts the nativity of Jesus, with saints Francis of Assisi and Lawrence among other figures surrounding Mary and the newborn Jesus. The painting is about 2.7 metres high and two metres wide. On the night of October 17–18, 1969, two thieves stole the painting from its home in the Oratory of Saint Lawrence in Palermo.[4] They cut the painting from its frame, and also took a carpet which authorities believe was used to roll up the painting.
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Roma

The painting, together with a Crucifixion of Saint Peter, was commissioned by Monsignor (later Cardinal) Tiberio Cerasi, Treasurer-General to Pope Clement VIII, in September 1600. According to Caravaggio's early biographer Giovanni Baglione, both paintings were rejected by Cerasi, and replaced by the second versions which hang in the chapel today. The dates of completion and rejection are determined from the death of Cerasi in May 1601. Baglione states that the first versions of both paintings were taken by Cardinal Giacomo Sannessio, but another early writer, Giulio Mancini, says that Sannessio's paintings were copies. Nevertheless, most scholars are satisfied that this is the first version of the Conversion of Paul.
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Roma

The large canvas shows the three executioners struggling to upright the cross. Peter is already nailed on the beams, his hands and feet are bleeding. The apostle is naked except a white loincloth around his waist, emphasising his vulnerability. He is an old man, with grey beard and bald head, but his aged body is still muscular suggesting considerable strength. He is raising himself up from the cross with great effort, twisting his whole body, as if he was trying to look towards something that is outside the painting. His eyes do not look at the viewer but turn towards the Assumption of Mary on the altar.
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Crucifixion of Saint Peter

Year 1601
Medium Oil on canvas
Dimensions230 × 175 cm (91 × 69 in)
Location Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome

Roma

The painting depicts this moment recounted in the Acts of the Apostles, except Caravaggio has Saul falling off a horse (which is not mentioned in the story) on the road to Damascus, seeing a blinding light and hearing the voice of Jesus. For Saul this is a moment of intense religious ecstasy: he is lying on the ground, supine, eyes shut, with his legs spread and his arms raised upward as if embracing his vision. The saint is a muscular young man, and his garment looks like a Renaissance version of a Roman soldier's attire: orange and green muscle cuirass, pteruges, tunic and boots. His plumed helmet fell off his head and his sword is lying by his side. The red cape almost looks like a blanket under his body. The horse is passing over him led by an old groom, who points his finger at the ground.
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The Conversion on the Way to Damascus

Year 1601
Medium Oil on canvas
Dimensions230 × 175 cm (91 × 69 in)
Location Santa Maria del Popolo, Rome

London

Caravaggio painted another version of the Supper at Emmaus (now in the Brera, Milan) in 1606. By comparison, the gestures of figures are far more restrained, making presence more important than performance. The art techniques used in both versions is the Trompe-l'œil style which seems to allow characters moving in their gestures, as a means to grab the attention of the observers. This difference possibly reflects the circumstances of Caravaggio's life at that point (he had fled Rome as an outlaw following the death of Ranuccio Tomassoni), or possibly, recognising the ongoing evolution of his art, in the intervening five years he had come to recognise the value of understatement.
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Berlin

The subject was common for the age. Caravaggio's treatment is remarkable for the realism of his Cupid – where other depictions, such as a contemporary Sleeping Cupid by Battistello Caracciolo, show an idealised, almost generic, beautiful boy, Caravaggio's Cupid is highly individual, charming but not at all beautiful, all crooked teeth and crooked grin: one feels that one would recognise him in the street. The shock of the Caravaggio, quite apart from the dramatic chiaroscuro lighting and the photographic clarity, is the mingling of the allegorical and the real, this sense it gives of a child who is having a thoroughly good time dressing up in stage-prop wings with a bunch of arrows and having his picture painted.
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Amor Vincit Omnia

Year 1601–1602
Medium Oil on canvas
Dimensions156 × 113 cm (61 × 44 in)
Location Gemäldegalerie, Berlin

Potsdam

In the painting, Thomas's face shows surprise as Jesus holds his hand and guides it into the wound. The absence of a halo emphasizes the corporeality of the risen Christ. [failed verification] The work is in chiaroscuro. A second version of "The Incredulity of Saint Thomas" has been re-discovered in Trieste, Italy in a private collection. It is published in the Maurizio Marini corpus catalogico "Caravaggio - Pictor praestantissimus" Newton & Compton - 2005 in the position Q50. The painting is declared "d'interesse artistico e storico" by the "Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali Sopraintendenza Regionale del Fiuli - Venezia Giulia". Its authenticity has been attested by several experts including Maurizio Marini and Denis Mahon and confirmed by a court in Trieste.[citation needed]
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Dublin

There are seven figures in the painting: from left to right they are John, Jesus, Judas, three soldiers (the one farthest to the right barely visible in the rear), and a man holding a lantern to the scene. They are standing, and only the upper three-quarters of their bodies are depicted. Judas has just kissed Jesus to identify him for the soldiers. The figures are arrayed before a very dark background, in which the setting is obscured. The main light source is not evident in the painting but comes from the upper left; the lesser light source is the lantern held by the man at the right (believed to be a self-portrait of Caravaggio; also, presumably, representing St Peter, who would first betray Jesus by denying him, and then go on to bring the light of Christ to the world).
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