Caravaggio Street Painting Florence Italy

Cari Amici (Dear Friends),

I have written of some of the problems with the Comune (City Hall) that the madonnari (street painters) of Florence, Italy, have been having. We now may only draw in groups because we are only permitted one drawing per day and we have many artists in our organization who need to work.

Last week my group of three artists took on two newcomers. So we chose to draw Caravaggio’s famous painting “The Supper at Emmaus.” This painting depicts the moment when two disciples recognize their risen Jesus because of his way of starting a meal together. Apparently Caravaggio depicted Christ in a young and slightly feminine way to help explain why the disciples had not recognized the man they had spent the day with until just this moment.

Three of us started the work, with the other two arriving later. I chose to draw the old man on the right. Our group had discussed the week before about having some sort of rotations system so that the guy who had to work elsewhere in the mornings was not always drawing the minor figures. So we saved Jesus for Johnny (and he did a fantastic job of him!).



When I draw alone, I determine the outer dimensions of my drawing and grid only the areas of the face. In a group situation, it is better to create a grid over the entire composition, each artist relating shapes to grid marks and not to the work of the other artsts. Some images of my start.

This next image shows our efforts after midnight the first day. In truth, I did not photograph the other parts because our two new colleagues did not draw so well. They asked us to show them how to draw faces, which we did for some time. However, it is one thing to teach a fine artist how to alter their techniques into those of a street performing artist; while totally another to teach someone basic drawing skills.

One artist in our regular group tried to rework the faces after the new ones left, and later, when the sun was down and the tungsten street lamps were on, a bit more color was added. Check out the turkey and the fruit from the previous image. Not so bad in this light, but garishly loud by sunlight! We laughed about the orange in the face and the neon fruit the next morning. Normally we try to respect one another’s drawings by not touching a part another worked on, but since our income depended on quality and also the responsible artists were not returning, no harm done.

I took these last two images after midnight the second and last day. I drew the old man on the right and the green coat of the man on the lower left. I also drew the bread and two vases in the lower left corner. This is a very cool painting. Caravaggio really was a fantastic artist, even if he was a murderer too. ;-)