Monday July 9, 2012

Monday July 9

We started our day today with a visit to Santa Maria dell'Orazione e Morte, certainly the most disturbing of our stops thus far. A church dedicated to death and prayer built in 1575 as a reminder of the certainty of death, and the need to follow the churches doctrine to assure peace for your soul. The crypt below the church contains the remains of many people that would have been found in the streets, many not identified. The décor of the room was quite disturbing, with spine chandeliers and skull displays on the walls, certainly not a place that I would want to frequent!

I was pleased to move on to the next church, San Pietro in Montorio. This church was commissioned by Phillip III of Spain, as a way to show a place of power within Rome.  This wealthy church is home to Sebastiano Del Piombo’s fresco entitled Flagellation. Based on drawings supplied by Michelangelo but Pombo’s painting style showed a more naturalistic style than that of Michelangelo as well as more use of chiaroscuro for a deeper dramatic effect.

Within this same church was the Raymondi Chapel, an early work of Bernini. The chapel was done as a complete space, rather than individual artistic elements. With the use of light, he was able to create natural highlights on the altarpiece that give visual cues to hierarchy of important themes. The chapel highlights the cycle of death in both the paintings and the sculpture scenes on the sarcophagi.

After a break we got to delve into the hot-tempered life of Caravaggio! Caravaggio came to Rome as a young man, at the time of late mannerism, and his realistic painting style was not immediately accepted in Rome. However, Cardinal De Monte noticed his work, and Caravaggio was soon taken into the cardinal’s home as part of the familia. Caravaggio painted directly onto the surface without study drawings, unlike other painters of that time. He also drew from life, only what he saw, and nothing more.  Although his personal life was violent in nature, his paintings were extremely insightful in nature.

St Luigi dei Francesi is home to Caravaggio’s first public commission, scenes from the life of St Matthew, 1597-1603.  The Calling of St Matthew, The Writing of The Gospels, and the Death of Matthew all show the artist’s control of extreme realism, using elements from real life and dramatic use of light and dark contrasts. The effect is an intense display that elicits a strong emotional experience.

At St Agostino we saw Caravaggio’s Madonna de Pepelo. The power of this painting was to show the Madonna as an everyday person, earthbound, someone approachable and real. The pilgrims bowing to her were easy to connect to on a personal level. Rather than just telling a story as a lesson in religion, this painting had an emotional impact on the public, and helped to boost Caravaggio’s power as a painter.