Death of the Virgin (Caravaggio)
Overview
 
The Death of the Virgin (1606) is a painting completed by the Italian
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

 Baroque
Baroque
The Baroque is a period and the style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music...

 master Caravaggio. It is a near contemporary with the Madonna with Saint Anne
Madonna and Child with St. Anne (Dei Palafrenieri) (Caravaggio)
The Madonna and Child with St. Anne is one of the mature religious works of the Italian Baroque master Caravaggio, painted in 1605-1606, for the altar of Archconfraternity of the Papal Grooms in the Basilica of Saint Peter...

 now at the Galleria Borghese
Galleria Borghese
The Borghese Gallery is an art gallery in Rome, Italy, housed in the former Villa Borghese Pinciana. It is a building that was from the first integral with its gardens, nowadays considered quite separately by tourists as the Villa Borghese gardens...

. It was commissioned by Laerzio Alberti, a papal lawyer, for his chapel in the Carmelite church of Santa Maria della Scala
Santa Maria della Scala
Santa Maria della Scala is a titular church in Rome, found in the Trastevere neighborhood.-History:The church was built to honor a miraculous icon of the Madonna. Tradition holds that the icon, when placed on the landing of a staircase of a neighboring house of a mother who prayed before it, had...

 in Trastevere
Trastevere
Trastevere is rione XIII of Rome, on the west bank of the Tiber, south of Vatican City. Its name comes from the Latin trans Tiberim, meaning literally "beyond the Tiber". The correct pronunciation is "tras-TEH-ve-ray", with the accent on the second syllable. Its logo is a golden head of a lion on a...

, Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

.

The depiction of the Death of the Virgin
Death of the Virgin
The Death of the Virgin Mary is a common theme in Western Christian art, comparable to the Dormition in Eastern Orthodox art. It becomes less common as the doctrine of the Assumption gains support in the Roman Catholic Church from the late Middle Ages onwards...

 caused a contemporary stir, and was rejected as unfit by the parish. It was acquired by the Gonzaga family in Mantua and subsequently, upon the recommendation by Peter Paul Rubens, who praised it as one of Caravaggio's best works, the painting was bought by Vincenzo Gonzaga, Duke of Mantua, whose collection had later to be sold to Charles I
Charles I of England
Charles I was King of England, King of Scotland, and King of Ireland from 27 March 1625 until his execution in 1649. Charles engaged in a struggle for power with the Parliament of England, attempting to obtain royal revenue whilst Parliament sought to curb his Royal prerogative which Charles...

 of England.
 
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