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Article: Caravaggio and Caravaggism
- Article from:
- Europe, 1450 to 1789: Encyclopedia of the Early Modern World
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CARAVAGGIO AND CARAVAGGISM
CARAVAGGIO AND CARAVAGGISM.
Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (born 1571, Milan or Caravaggio; died 18 July 1610, Porto Ercole), called Caravaggio, was the most radical painter in post-Tridentine Italy. In his religious and mythological compositions, he mocked Roman classical tradition by depicting his models
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"people in the street" rather than antique marbles
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in an unidealized, naturalistic style. He staged his scenes
in the costumes and settings of contemporary society, not those of the ancient past. Even the Carracci, who in the 1580s had revolutionized Italian painting at their academy in Bologna, had not attacked tradition (the ...