Although fictional responses to Caravaggio date back to the painter's lifetime (1571-1610), it was during the second half of the twentieth century that interest in him took off outside the world of art history. In this new monograph, the first book-length study of Caravaggio's recent impact, Rorato provides a panoramic overview of his appropriation by popular culture. The extent of the Caravaggio myth, and its self-perpetuating nature, are brought out by a series of case studies involving authors and directors from numerous countries (Italy, Great Britain, America, Canada, France and Norway) and literary and filmic texts from a number of genres - from straightforward tellings of his life to crime fiction, homoerotic film and postcolonial literature.

Although fictional responses to Caravaggio date back to the painter's lifetime (1571-1610), it was during the second half of the twentieth century that interest in him took off outside the world of art history. In this new monograph, the first book-length study of Caravaggio's recent impact, Rorato provides a panoramic overview of his appropriation by popular culture. The extent of the Caravaggio myth, and its self-perpetuating nature, are brought out by a series of case studies involving authors and directors from numerous countries (Italy, Great Britain, America, Canada, France and Norway) and literary and filmic texts from a number of genres - from straightforward tellings of his life to crime fiction, homoerotic film and postcolonial literature.

My sight was always good. But color now takes on even greater riches. I no longer need the bright blues and reds, which I did so delight in when I was young. I see a hundred times more beauty now in a dark brown, or the pale tints of quiet flesh. Or a ray of light across a fur or a beaten earth floor or a suit of black armor. Such colors do not distract the eye, but rather let it concentrate on my forte, the human face. There I will have my theater, there my drama, there my applause. Peachment's imagined Caravaggio, while still a child, overhears his parents discussing one of his sketches, and realizes he has a talent that sets him apart from the world. He leaves family and home forever to map out a solitary traveler's life. Caravaggio became a revolutionary of his time, a rebellious and dangerous man to know, a man governed by his genius, his indiscriminate sexual appetite, and his murderous rage. He was sought far and wide in the late Renaissance world for his art, and there was a price on his head for at least one murder. This is Caravaggio's confession, told in humorous, blasphemous, often brutal prose, which cleverly beguiles the reader into understanding the art that was so celebrated and the life that caused so much outrage. Peachment's Caravaggio is a gripping story of one man's determination to grapple with the truth as he journeys through Rome, Naples, Malta, and Sicily, encounters lovers and enemies, endures madness, exile, and imprisonment, and faces a final showdown with the Vatican Secret Service. His account is poignant and spirited. It is an adventurous and thoroughly enthralling insight into the mind of a creative genius and the violent world that inspired his paintings.

Since cinema's earliest days, literary adaptation has provided the movies with stories; and so we use literary terms like metaphor, metonymy and synecdoche to describe visual things. But there is another way of looking at film, and that is through its relationship with the visual arts – mainly painting, the oldest of the art forms. Art History for Filmmakers is an inspiring guide to how images from art can be used by filmmakers to establish period detail, and to teach composition, color theory and lighting. The book looks at the key moments in the development of the Western painting, and how these became part of the Western visual culture from which cinema emerges, before exploring how paintings can be representative of different genres, such as horror, sex, violence, realism and fantasy, and how the images in these paintings connect with cinema. Insightful case studies explore the links between art and cinema through the work of seven high-profile filmmakers, including Peter Greenaway, Peter Webber, Jack Cardiff, Martin Scorsese, Guillermo del Toro, Quentin Tarantino and Stan Douglas. A range of practical exercises are included in the text, which can be carried out singly or in small teams. Featuring stunning full-color images, Art History for Filmmakers provides budding filmmakers with a practical guide to how images from art can help to develop their understanding of the visual language of film.

A New York Times Book Review Editors' Choice and a Washington Post Notable Book of the Year "This book resees its subject with rare clarity and power as a painter for the 21st century." —Hilary Spurling, New York Times Book Review Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (1571–1610) lived the darkest and most dangerous life of any of the great painters. This commanding biography explores Caravaggio’s staggering artistic achievements, his volatile personal trajectory, and his tragic and mysterious death at age thirty-eight. Featuring more than eighty full-color reproductions of the artist’s best paintings, Caravaggio is a masterful profile of the mercurial painter.

Told with consummate skill by the writer of the bestselling, award-winning A Civil Action, The Lost Painting is a remarkable synthesis of history and detective story. An Italian village on a hilltop near the Adriatic coast, a decaying palazzo facing the sea, and in the basement, cobwebbed and dusty, lit by a single bulb, an archive unknown to scholars. Here, a young graduate student from Rome, Francesca Cappelletti, makes a discovery that inspires a search for a work of art of incalculable value, a painting lost for almost two centuries. The artist was Caravaggio, a master of the Italian Baroque. He was a genius, a revolutionary painter, and a man beset by personal demons. Four hundred years ago, he drank and brawled in the taverns and streets of Rome, moving from one rooming house to another, constantly in and out of jail, all the while painting works of transcendent emotional and visual power. He rose from obscurity to fame and wealth, but success didn’t alter his violent temperament. His rage finally led him to commit murder, forcing him to flee Rome a hunted man. He died young, alone, and under strange circumstances. Caravaggio scholars estimate that between sixty and eighty of his works are in existence today. Many others–no one knows the precise number–have been lost to time. Somewhere, surely, a masterpiece lies forgotten in a storeroom, or in a small parish church, or hanging above a fireplace, mistaken for a mere copy. Prizewinning author Jonathan Harr embarks on an spellbinding journey to discover the long-lost painting known as The Taking of Christ–its mysterious fate and the circumstances of its disappearance have captivated Caravaggio devotees for years. After Francesca Cappelletti stumbles across a clue in that dusty archive, she tracks the painting across a continent and hundreds of years of history. But it is not until she meets Sergio Benedetti, an art restorer working in Ireland, that she finally manages to assemble all the pieces of the puzzle. Praise for The Lost Painting “Jonathan Harr has gone to the trouble of writing what will probably be a bestseller . . . rich and wonderful. . . . In truth, the book reads better than a thriller. . . . If you're a sucker for Rome, and for dusk . . . [you'll] enjoy Harr's more clearly reported details about life in the city.”—The New York Times Book Review “Jonathan Harr has taken the story of the lost painting, and woven from it a deeply moving narrative about history, art and taste—and about the greed, envy, covetousness and professional jealousy of people who fall prey to obsession. It is as perfect a work of narrative nonfiction as you could ever hope to read.”—The Economist