Supper at Emmaus

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Supper at Emmaus: Caravaggio

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Caravaggio Oil Painting - Supper at Emmaus

Keywords: Supper, Emmaus

Work Overview: Supper at Emmaus (Pilgrimage of Our Lord to Emmaus)
Artist Caravaggio
Year 1601
Medium Oil on canvas
Dimensions 141 cm × 196.2 cm (56 in × 77.2 in)
Location National Gallery, London

The Supper at Emmaus is a painting by the Italian Baroque master Caravaggio, executed in 1601, and now in the National Gallery in London. Originally this painting was commissioned and paid for by Ciriaco Mattei, brother of cardinal Girolamo Mattei.

The painting depicts the moment when the resurrected but incognito Jesus, reveals himself to two of his disciples (presumed to be Luke and Cleopas) in the town of Emmaus, only to soon vanish from their sight (Gospel of Luke 24: 30-31). Cleopas wears the scallop shell of a pilgrim. The other apostle wears torn clothes. Cleopas gesticulates in a perspectively-challenging extension of arms in and out of the frame of reference. The standing groom, forehead smooth and face in darkness, appears oblivious to the event. The painting is unusual for the life-sized figures, the dark and blank background. The table lays out a still-life meal. Like the world these apostles knew, the basket of food teeters perilously over the edge.

In the Gospel of Mark (16:12) Jesus is said to have appeared to them "in another form", which may be why he is depicted beardless here, as opposed to the bearded Christ in Calling of St Matthew, where a group of seated money counters is interrupted by the recruiting Christ. It is also a recurring theme in Caravaggio's paintings to find the sublime interrupting the daily routine. The unexalted humanity is apt for this scene, since the human Jesus has made himself unrecognizable to his disciples, and at once confirms and surmounts his humanity. Caravaggio seems to suggest that perhaps a Jesus could enter our daily encounters. The dark background envelops the tableau.

Caravaggio painted another version of the Supper at Emmaus (now in the Brera, Milan) in 1606. By comparison, the gestures of figures are far more restrained, making presence more important than performance. This difference possibly reflects the circumstances of Caravaggio's life at that point (he had fled Rome as an outlaw following the death of Ranuccio Tomassoni), or possibly, recognising the ongoing evolution of his art, in the intervening five years he had come to recognise the value of understatement.

Two of Jesus' disciples were walking to Emmaus after the Crucifixion when the resurrected Jesus himself drew near and went with them, but they did not recognise him. At supper that evening in Emmaus '... he took bread, and blessed it, and brake and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew him; and he vanished out of their sight' (Luke 24: 30-31). Christ is shown at the moment of blessing the bread and revealing his true identity to the two disciples.

Caravaggio's innovative treatment of the subject makes this one of his most powerful works. The depiction of Christ is unusual in that he is beardless and great emphasis is given to the still life on the table. The intensity of the emotions of Christ's disciples is conveyed by their gestures and expression. The viewer too is made to feel a participant in the event.

The picture was commissioned by the Roman nobleman Ciriaco Mattei in 1601. Caravaggio painted a second, more subdued version of 'The Supper at Emmaus' about five years after the Gallery's work.

Also known as Pilgrimage of Our Lord to Emmaus. The painting shows the moment the two men finally realize who has been talking to them all day: their deceased teacher.

The man on the right is generally believed to be Peter because of the pilgrim's shell on his clothes, in which case the man on the left is Cleophas - the only one mentioned in by name in Luke's version.

The still-life elements on the table have symbolic meanings. The bread and the wine obviously refer to the Eucharist that is taking place. The grapes in turn refer to the wine, the apples to the Fall of Man, and the pomegranates symbolize the Church. So the table is not an ordinary table but an altar.

Some think the fish-tail shaped shadow to the right of the fruit basket may be an Ichthys symbol (the Jesus fish).

The painting was commissioned by Ciriaco Mattei, a brother of cardinal Mattei in whose Roman palazzo Caravaggio lived at the time. In 1606, Caravaggio made another version of this painting. In 1601 he may very well have been inspired by this Emmaus by Titian.

Almost identical copies of this painting and of The Incredulity of Saint Thomas were found in a church in the French Loire town of Loches in 1999. After investigation, it was announced in 2006 that both works were authentic Caravaggios. Both contain the shield of arms of Philippe de Bethune, a friend of Caravaggio's and French ambassador in Rome. Records show that De Bethune acquired four paintings from his friend. Caravaggio often made several copies of his own paintings.

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The Supper at Emmaus, painted in 1601 for a Roman nobleman, comes from the outset of a new, mature phase of the master’s career in which he treated great religious subjects with uncompromising realism, while at the same time employing his trademark contrasts of light and dark to great dramatic effect. In this revelatory image, two of Christ’s disciples have just recognized that the stranger at their table is none other than Christ himself, reappearing to them after his death and Resurrection.

The Supper at Emmaus will serve as the centerpiece for a focus installation in Gallery 211 of the Art Institute’s collection of “Caravaggesque” paintings. Caravaggio’s insistence on heightened realism and the sculptural qualities of his figures, often brightly lit against a dark background, are evident in works such as Bartolomeo Manfredi’s Cupid Chastised and Cecco del Caravaggio’s The Resurrection.

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