Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio lived the darkest and most dangerous life of any of the great painters. The worlds of Milan, Rome, and, Naples through which Caravaggio moved and which Andrew Graham-Dixon describes brilliantly in this book, are those of cardinals and whores, prayer and violence. On the streets surrounding the churches and palaces, brawls and swordfights were regular occurrences. In one such fight, Caravaggio killed Ranuccio Tomassoni, a pimp, and fled to Naples and then Malta, home to the Knights of St John, where he escaped from prison following his conviction for another vicious assault. Shortly afterwards he died while returning to Rome to seek a papal pardon for his crimes. He was thirty-eight years old. In the course of this desperate life, Caravaggio created the most dramatic paintings of his age, using ordinary men and women - often prostitutes and the very poor - to model for his depictions of classic religious scenes. Andrew Graham-Dixon's exceptionally illuminating readings of Caravaggio's pictures, which are the heart of the book, show very clearly how he created their drama, immediacy and humanity, and how completely he departed from the conventions of his time.

About the Author

For more than twenty-five years, Andrew Graham Dixon has published a weekly column on art, first in the Independent and more recently, the Sunday Telegraph. He has written a number of acclaimed books, including A History of British Art and Renaissance, and is twice winner of the Hawthornden Prize, Britain's top prize for writing about art. He is one of the leading figures in broadcasting in the UK, having presented seven major television series on art for the BBC.

Reviews

Caravaggio has rarely been seen in such depth and such relief as in this marvellous biography. Andrew Graham-Dixon reads Caravaggio's paintings with the habits and assumptions, thoughts and fears of his contemporaries so that we see and feel the paintings more acutely and intensely than before. The man and his work emerge enriched and enlivened -- Neil Macgregor, Director Of The British Museum Caravaggio: A Life Sacred and Profane gave me immense pleasure and provided constant delight. It is a thrilling lesson in the art of seeing, a sensual exploration of the shadows of Caravaggio's sometimes violent but always Christian world, a detective story with a highly satisfying ending. Andrew Graham-Dixon's ability to have a reader see a painting through written language is a rare and precious gift. The book's rigour and integrity are obvious. I trusted every word and was sorry to turn the final page -- Peter Carey

The life of Michelangelo Merisi, known as Caravaggio (1571-1610), writes British art critic Graham-Dixon in this masterful biography, was like his art: "a series of lightning flashes in the darkest of nights." Graham-Dixon's briskly and elegantly composed study thoroughly contextualizing the artist's early life in the town of Caravaggio and in Milan, a city dominated by Archbishop Carlo Borromeo, whose fearsome doctrine of mass repentance and the selective role of visual spectacle influenced Caravaggio. By the time the artist left Milan for Rome, he had decided to become an artist. The author then chronicles Caravaggio's artistic success in Rome, where, at the age of 24, he found patronage by Cardinal del Monte. He created many masterpieces there, but the rejection of The Death of the Virgin by its ecclesiastical commissioners, the author argues, may have prompted Caravaggio to commit murder. He fled to Naples, then to Malta; he died at age 38, after a troubled and "disordered" life. That Graham-Dixon (Michelangelo and the Sistine Chapel) took a decade to research and write this insightful and fascinating book shows in the depth of its research, the skillfulness of its historical and artistic analysis, and the deft fluidity with which it is expressed. This is a rare tour-de-force. 40 pages of color illus.; 4 maps. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

New publications (e.g., Michael Fried's The Moment of Caravaggio and John T. Spike's Caravaggio) continue to appear in commemoration of the 400th anniversary of the death of Caravaggio. This one takes a more biographical than art historical approach to the controversial artist. Art critic and BBC television art series presenter Graham-Dixon (Michelangelo and the Sistine Chapel) firmly places Caravaggio in his milieu right from the beginning of his life, discussing the important connection between his family and the family of one of the heroes of the Battle of Lepanto, which took place eight days after Caravaggio's birth. Further reading suggestions (English and Italian), an index, endnotes, and maps are included. VERDICT Recommended for special collections, art faculty and students, and interested general readers. (Final images not seen.)-Nancy J. Mactague, Aurora Univ. Lib., IL (c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.