Bodies and Shadows: Caravaggio and His Legacy

Following the 2010 400^th anniversary of Caravaggio and coinciding with the year of Italian culture in 2013, Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) celebrates one of the most influential painters in European history, Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1571 Milan- Porto Ercole, 1610) known for his striking light and dark contrasts, dramatic realism, and intense psychological compositions.

LACMA's US premiere includes eight Caravaggio paintings displayed alongside 50 additional 17^th century European Caravaggist artists from France, Spain, and the Netherlands, who followed in his footsteps. Included are Baglione, Saraceni, Orazio and Artemisia Gentileschi, Manfredi, Vouet and Valentin as well as Honthorst.

Featured is Caravaggio's first religious composition, Saint Francis of Assisi in Ecstasy (c. 1595, Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, Hartford, Connecticut), thought to be the artist's self-portrait. In addition, on view for the first time in the United States, and attributed to Caravaggio just three years ago, is the Portrait of Maffeo Barberini, (1596-1597, Private Collection, Florence, Italy) who became Pope Urban VIII in 1623.

The exhibit's design enables comparisons between several themes such as Caravaggio's dramatically engaging, The Toothpuller (circa 1608-1609, Galleria Palatina, Palazzo Pitti, Florence, Italy), and Atelier of Theodoor Rombouts' The Toothpuller (circa 1625-1630, Musée d'Art Roger Quilliot, Clermont-Ferrand, France).

Caravaggio's revolutionary style is featured in highlighted works such as the ordinary looking Martha and Mary Magdalen (circa 1598, Detroit Institute of Art), in Saint John the Baptist in the Wilderness (1604-1605, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, Missouri) dressed with animal skin, in the off center Jesus in Ecce Homo (1605 Musei di Strada Nuova, Genoa, Italy), as well as in his last two works painted shortly prior to his death, The Denial of Saint Peter (1610, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York), and Caravaggio's own head on the platter in Salome Receives the Head of St. John the Baptist (circa 1606-1610, National Gallery, London England).

The Robert H. Ahmanson Chief Curator of European Art at LACMA, Patrice Marandel, worked on this exhibit for approximately ten years, under the auspices of FRAME (French Regional American Museum Exchange), Musée des Augustins of Toulouse, the Musée Fabre du Montpellier, Los angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) and the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Arts of Hartford, with installation designed by Frederick Fisher and Partners Architects.

The exhibit runs from November 11, 2012, through February 10, 2013, at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) Lynda and Stewart Resnick Exhibition Pavilion, located at 5905 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90036. For more information call (323) 857-6000 or visit www.lacma.org