Carry On Caravaggio: Part 2
Well that is the U.S leg done, dusted, polished and left to shine. Now I fly back briefly to London Heathrow, to breath in the glorious smell of sarcastic humour that has been so lacking for the last five days in the States! Next stop this afternoon is Madrid and then on to Milan tonight.
I had twelve U.S based Caravaggios to see and twelve were seen; fifty five paintings left to do! I am not sure if I want to know the alcoholic unit to painting ratio so far but I'm sure Caravaggio, the great man himself, held a pretty aggressive line on that one.
I had a great last night in New York.
My schedule was going to be very sharp. I had flown into Kansas, from Chicago, at 8.45 am in the morning, quickly seen 'Saint John the Baptist' at the Nelson-Atkins Museum at Midday, flown out to La Guardia at 14:35pm, arriving at 18:27pm and then to attend My Cara cocktail party needed to be in mid-town Manhattan at 20:00 pm. With the Pope 'in town' and also the United Nations meeting, the whole place was in lock down. I had been reliably informed by literally everyone, that the chances of making the party were nil. But no-one stands in the way of a thirsty art tourist and his jollification. We landed at 18:30 and I was in the bar next to the venue at 19:45, having been to the diminutive toilets, changed into full Caravaggesque costume, washed my hands and had a pint of Samuel Adams poured and waiting frothily on the bar for me. The referee had blown his whistle and the evening had begun.
Caravaggio waiter in NY
Kathryn, Tim and Richard, had a simple role in the tour; a) make sure I didn't get too drunk in the Big Apple b) make sure I didn't lose my passport and c) make sure I didn't lose my wallet. Well done team, zero out of three scored. Great effort!
Fortunately for you them, in the morning, I found my passport in my sock and my wallet in my underwear, which like a gospel miracle, appeared during my daily ritual of disposing of all the previous day's clothes in my bedroom bin. My Caravaggio fancy dress does not have any pockets, so I think that's why my wallet was down my 'undies'. As for c), being 'too drunk', I have searched everywhere but still cannot find my dignity.
Our waiter or server as the Yanks seem to call them, was not only Italian but also an art student and bore a thunderingly close resemblance to Caravaggio himself. Kathryn had ordered artichokes as one of the 'taster dishes', which was inspired. Not that I like artichokes (who does?) but between 1600 and 1606, out of a total of fourteen times when Caravaggio's name appeared on police records, six of which landed him in jail, on the fourth occasion it was for throwing artichokes at a waiter. The taster dish was a scrumptious synchronicity.
"Statement to police by Pietro Antonio de Fosaccia, waiter, 26 April 1604:
About 17 o'clock [lunchtime] the accused, together with two other people, was eating in the Moor's restaurant at La Maddalena, where I work as a waiter. I brought them eight cooked artichokes, four cooked in butter and four fried in oil. The accused asked me which were cooked in butter and which fried in oil, and I told him to smell them, which would easily enable him to tell the difference.
Kansas Nelson Atkins Museum
He got angry and without saying anything more, grabbed an earthenware dish and hit me on the cheek at the level of my moustache, injuring me slightly... and then he got up and grabbed his friend's sword which was lying on the table, intending perhaps to strike me with it, but I got up and came here to the police station to make a formal complaint..."
Caravaggio's waiter in the Moor's restaurant was obviously a pretentious young man. Firstly, his surname 'Fosaccia' was blatantly mis-spelt and surely much more likely to have been 'Focaccia'? No doubt confused by this deception, as any of us would be, Caravaggio threw the plate at him, shouting, "Focaccia, you stupid flat oven baked Italian bread product (wikipedia) ", before naturally drawing his sword, to divide the flat bread into even quarters. This explains his 'illegal' public use of a sword. As for the artichokes: How is a man meant to diet properly and Caravaggio was prone to weight gain, when not knowing if the artichokes have oil or butter on them?
Our own waiter at the buzzy Almond restaurant, was a super chap. He posed for photos and seemed generally ambivalent to having an artichoke (with butter not oil) placed onto his head. After having tucked a few bottles of the Barbera d'Alba under my belt, a cheeky red Piedmont, which has been documented in Italy from as early as the 17th Century evidently, (we settled for the 2010), Limoncello was taken. Yet again the beautiful Kathryn had out-drunk us all.
Despite making serious single handed inroads into New York's Italian wine lake, I still made it on time the next morning, to be outside the Metropolitan Art Museum ten minutes before the opening. Admirably, so did Tim and Richard. The Pope who had flown into NYC to join 'Carry on Caravaggio' failed to show. He was probably waylaid due to the enormous security that the city had erected around my trip. With such heightened concerns from the Papal and my own visit, no luggage was allowed inside the gallery at all. Consequently, Tim volunteered to stand outside, on the steps, guarding my suitcase. I felt sorry for him but also for the man behind us in the queue, as his wife was a real old bag and it was likely he would have to stand outside as well.
The 'Met' has three Caravaggio paintings and all of them are very different to each other. 'The Musicians', is a homo erotic painting that has caused Caravaggio to be labelled perpetually as bi-sexual. It was painted for Cardinal del Monte, (no he wasn't the one who sold canned pineapple chunks) and features Caravaggio's life-long friend the beautiful Mario Minniti. It is undeniably one of the most important paintings in the artist's canon, showing an early sensitivity and purity that announced his real potential to the religious hierarchy of continental Europe. 'The Denial of St Peter' is one of Caravaggio's latest paintings, probably finished in the year of his death in 1610. It sits strikingly discordant to the much earlier canvas. The brushwork is much more urgent, even described as 'feverish'. However, it is a resounding example of the narrative intensity, the ability to capture the vital moment of the story, that became Caravaggio's trademark. The third painting is of 'The Holy Family, with John the Baptist' again a gentle anomaly to the other two.
Tim, then redeemed himself again for not protecting me the night before, by driving me for three hours to the Wadsworth Athenaeum Art Museum in Hartford, Connecticut, and then driving for another three hours all the way back to JFK Airport, for me to catch my flight back to London. What was one of my least favourite Caravaggio paintings, St Francis in Ecstasy, in the Wadsworth, turned out to be truly wonderful. Seeing these masterpieces in real life is so much better!
I had twelve U.S based Caravaggios to see and twelve were seen; fifty five paintings left to do! I am not sure if I want to know the alcoholic unit to painting ratio so far but I'm sure Caravaggio, the great man himself, held a pretty aggressive line on that one.
I had a great last night in New York.
My schedule was going to be very sharp. I had flown into Kansas, from Chicago, at 8.45 am in the morning, quickly seen 'Saint John the Baptist' at the Nelson-Atkins Museum at Midday, flown out to La Guardia at 14:35pm, arriving at 18:27pm and then to attend My Cara cocktail party needed to be in mid-town Manhattan at 20:00 pm. With the Pope 'in town' and also the United Nations meeting, the whole place was in lock down. I had been reliably informed by literally everyone, that the chances of making the party were nil. But no-one stands in the way of a thirsty art tourist and his jollification. We landed at 18:30 and I was in the bar next to the venue at 19:45, having been to the diminutive toilets, changed into full Caravaggesque costume, washed my hands and had a pint of Samuel Adams poured and waiting frothily on the bar for me. The referee had blown his whistle and the evening had begun.
Caravaggio waiter in NY Kathryn, Tim and Richard, had a simple role in the tour; a) make sure I didn't get too drunk in the Big Apple b) make sure I didn't lose my passport and c) make sure I didn't lose my wallet. Well done team, zero out of three scored. Great effort!
Fortunately for you them, in the morning, I found my passport in my sock and my wallet in my underwear, which like a gospel miracle, appeared during my daily ritual of disposing of all the previous day's clothes in my bedroom bin. My Caravaggio fancy dress does not have any pockets, so I think that's why my wallet was down my 'undies'. As for c), being 'too drunk', I have searched everywhere but still cannot find my dignity.
Our waiter or server as the Yanks seem to call them, was not only Italian but also an art student and bore a thunderingly close resemblance to Caravaggio himself. Kathryn had ordered artichokes as one of the 'taster dishes', which was inspired. Not that I like artichokes (who does?) but between 1600 and 1606, out of a total of fourteen times when Caravaggio's name appeared on police records, six of which landed him in jail, on the fourth occasion it was for throwing artichokes at a waiter. The taster dish was a scrumptious synchronicity.
"Statement to police by Pietro Antonio de Fosaccia, waiter, 26 April 1604:
About 17 o'clock [lunchtime] the accused, together with two other people, was eating in the Moor's restaurant at La Maddalena, where I work as a waiter. I brought them eight cooked artichokes, four cooked in butter and four fried in oil. The accused asked me which were cooked in butter and which fried in oil, and I told him to smell them, which would easily enable him to tell the difference.
Kansas Nelson Atkins MuseumHe got angry and without saying anything more, grabbed an earthenware dish and hit me on the cheek at the level of my moustache, injuring me slightly... and then he got up and grabbed his friend's sword which was lying on the table, intending perhaps to strike me with it, but I got up and came here to the police station to make a formal complaint..."
Caravaggio's waiter in the Moor's restaurant was obviously a pretentious young man. Firstly, his surname 'Fosaccia' was blatantly mis-spelt and surely much more likely to have been 'Focaccia'? No doubt confused by this deception, as any of us would be, Caravaggio threw the plate at him, shouting, "Focaccia, you stupid flat oven baked Italian bread product (wikipedia) ", before naturally drawing his sword, to divide the flat bread into even quarters. This explains his 'illegal' public use of a sword. As for the artichokes: How is a man meant to diet properly and Caravaggio was prone to weight gain, when not knowing if the artichokes have oil or butter on them?
Our own waiter at the buzzy Almond restaurant, was a super chap. He posed for photos and seemed generally ambivalent to having an artichoke (with butter not oil) placed onto his head. After having tucked a few bottles of the Barbera d'Alba under my belt, a cheeky red Piedmont, which has been documented in Italy from as early as the 17th Century evidently, (we settled for the 2010), Limoncello was taken. Yet again the beautiful Kathryn had out-drunk us all.
Despite making serious single handed inroads into New York's Italian wine lake, I still made it on time the next morning, to be outside the Metropolitan Art Museum ten minutes before the opening. Admirably, so did Tim and Richard. The Pope who had flown into NYC to join 'Carry on Caravaggio' failed to show. He was probably waylaid due to the enormous security that the city had erected around my trip. With such heightened concerns from the Papal and my own visit, no luggage was allowed inside the gallery at all. Consequently, Tim volunteered to stand outside, on the steps, guarding my suitcase. I felt sorry for him but also for the man behind us in the queue, as his wife was a real old bag and it was likely he would have to stand outside as well.
The 'Met' has three Caravaggio paintings and all of them are very different to each other. 'The Musicians', is a homo erotic painting that has caused Caravaggio to be labelled perpetually as bi-sexual. It was painted for Cardinal del Monte, (no he wasn't the one who sold canned pineapple chunks) and features Caravaggio's life-long friend the beautiful Mario Minniti. It is undeniably one of the most important paintings in the artist's canon, showing an early sensitivity and purity that announced his real potential to the religious hierarchy of continental Europe. 'The Denial of St Peter' is one of Caravaggio's latest paintings, probably finished in the year of his death in 1610. It sits strikingly discordant to the much earlier canvas. The brushwork is much more urgent, even described as 'feverish'. However, it is a resounding example of the narrative intensity, the ability to capture the vital moment of the story, that became Caravaggio's trademark. The third painting is of 'The Holy Family, with John the Baptist' again a gentle anomaly to the other two.
Tim, then redeemed himself again for not protecting me the night before, by driving me for three hours to the Wadsworth Athenaeum Art Museum in Hartford, Connecticut, and then driving for another three hours all the way back to JFK Airport, for me to catch my flight back to London. What was one of my least favourite Caravaggio paintings, St Francis in Ecstasy, in the Wadsworth, turned out to be truly wonderful. Seeing these masterpieces in real life is so much better!