Great, Great Christian Art

 

                                                        The Calling of Saint Matthew -- Caravaggio 

Last week I lamented the seemingly endless stream of kitschy and just plain bad art. From Maudlin Mother Mary to Ripped Caucasian Jesus it is a form of eye pollution.

Then their is the great, even sublime, Christian art from the past and to a lesser degree from the present that inspires the sense of transcendence and invitation to the divine that we hope for in religious experience. 

You may be aware that through the years I've written several times about the 16th century painter, Caravaggio, the general reprobate and convicted murderer who created some of the most intriguing biblical scenes of his time. The moody Netflix series, Ripley, set mainly in Italy,connects the psychopathic central character with Caravaggio both in temperament and the use of light and dark (chiarascuro).

I see that the chapel that Tom Ripley visits in one scene of the series has undergone a renovation with new lighting for what has been a dark space. 

Rome's famed 'cradle of Caravaggio, San Luigi de' Francesi, has got a new lighting system for the iconic Cycle of St Matthew painted by the Italian pre-Baroque master in the French church n the late 16th century-early 17th century. "It's a true, full-blown resurrection," said Brother Renaud Escande, administrator of the Pious Establishments of France in Rome and Loreto, who acts under the aegis of the French embassy... Of the three works that are a high point of Western art and Caravaggio's trademark chiaroscuro technique, perhaps the most celebrated is The Calling of Saint Matthew depicting the moment Jesus Christ calls on the tax collector Matthew to follow him.

Is the great art an antidote for the bad stuff? Let's hope so!

                  David and Goliath -- Caravaggio -- the head of Goliath may have been a self-portrait