By 1 am on Sunday 20,000 people had entered Rome’s Borghese Gallery, free of charge, to see nine paintings - five belonging to the Borghese and four on loan from other galleries in Rome – by Caravaggio. The “notte bianca” [all-night opening] was held to celebrate the four-hundredth anniversary of the artist’s death on 17th or 18th July 1610.
Art students were on hand to guide visitors and explain the paintings and in the nearby gardens two giant screens showed films about the master.
The Churches of San Luigi dei Francesi, Sant’Agostino and Santa Maria del Popolo also remained open to display their Caravaggios and special buses took tourists from the Borghese to the churches.
Rome’s superintendent of Museums, Rossella Vodret, said that the all-night show was a fitting tribute to an artist who had so often used the night as a backdrop to his paintings.
Recently bones thought to be Caravaggio’s have been found in Porto Ercole [Tuscany] and the Vatican newspaper, L’Osservatore Romano, has reported that a “new” Caravaggio painting depicting the Martyrdom of St Lawrence may have been found in Rome.
The painting is currently being analysed by experts.
