One of the finest paintings at the State Hermitage Museum happens to be The Lute Player (1595) by Michelangelo Merissi da Caravaggio (1571–1610). In 1592, when the artist was about twenty years old, he left the Lombard area of Italy and went to Rome. There Caravaggio initially gained employment with the little-known Sicilian painter Lorenzo Carli. Caravaggio quickly moved over to Calvaliere d’Arpino’s workshop, where he was put in charge of painting flowers and fruit. It was here that Caravaggio learned the workings of a large workshop operation and the mechanics of art patronage in Rome. After a couple of years at this workshop Caravaggio started creating paintings of half-length figures to sell on the open market to prove he could do more than paint flowers and fruit. Some of these early paintings include Boy Peeling a Fruit (1593/94), Self-portrait as Bacchus (1594) and Boy Bitten by a Lizard (1594). Of these paintings, Boy Peeling a Fruit is probably the oldest surviving Caravaggio painting in existence today. Though there are several copies of this painting, John T. Spike identified the likely original in a auction in London in 1996; its present location is in the British Royal Collection. In 2014 it was put on display in the Cumberland Gallery in Hampton Court Palace. Caravaggio’s early figurative paintings introduced the Roman public to a new genre that quickly began to attract collectors. The Flute Player is one of the first of these promotional paintings.
To read more on https://musings-on-art.org/caravaggio-early-work
