Caravaggio's "Boy with a Basket of Fruit" in Focus

This exhibition celebrates the extraordinary loan from the Galleria Borghese in Rome of the painting Boy with a Basket of Fruit, an important early work by Michelangelo Merisi, known as Caravaggio (1571–1610). Trained in his native Lombardy, Caravaggio brought to Rome a tradition of naturalism that stretched back to Leonardo da Vinci’s work in Milan. He combined this tradition, however, with a revolutionary approach to painting that shattered the illusion of art and instead celebrated the artifice of the studio.

With his parted lips, flushed ears, and shirt slipping from his shoulder, the Boy with a Basket of Fruit was far from the idealized figures typically depicted in Roman painting at the time. Presented with remarkable frankness, the model seems to be offered to us for examination, akin to the overripe fruit he holds. The exhibition juxtaposes this remarkable work with some precedents for its naturalism, including earlier paintings from Milan and by Caravaggio’s slightly older contemporary Annibale Carracci. The installation will also include a selection of works that document the powerful impact Caravaggio had on Roman art. It concludes with Gianlorenzo Bernini’s portrait drawing of Scipione Borghese, the early owner of the Boy with a Basket of Fruit painting and the collector largely responsible for the Galleria Borghese.