Caravaggio, Judith Beheading Holofernes, 1598-99, oil on canvas, 57
Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio would have been 545 years old today. He actually only lived to be 38 years old, which is somewhat miraculous considering his tumultuous life. We know more about him from law books than anything else. He was brought to court in Rome for beating up a waiter, disfiguring a prostitute who refused him, and he was convicted of a murder that occurred after a tennis match.
Maybe it was his passionate and violent temperament that led him to create some of the most dramatic art of his time. He employed a technique of painting called chiaroscuro, which cast his intense scenes in dramatic lighting. This type of modeling would spread throughout Europe, influencing artists such as Diego Velázquez and Rembrandt van Rijn.
