In this artwork, how is the Composition discussed?
The painting shows the sisters Martha and Mary from the New Testament. Martha is in the act of converting Mary from her life of pleasure to the life of virtue in Christ. Martha, her face shadowed, leans forward, passionately arguing with Mary, who twirls an orange blossom between her fingers as she holds a mirror, symbolising the vanity she is about to give up. The power of the image lies in Mary's face, caught at the moment when conversion begins.
Martha and Mary was painted while Caravaggio was living in the palazzo of his patron, Cardinal Del Monte. His paintings for Del Monte fall into two groups: the secular genre pieces such as The Musicians, The Lute Player, and Bacchus – all featuring boys and youths in somewhat claustrophobic interior scenes – and religious images such as Rest on the Flight into Egypt and Ecstasy of Saint Francis. Among the religious paintings was a group of four works featuring the same two female models, together or singly. The models were two well-known courtesans who frequented the palazzi of Del Monte and other wealthy and powerful art patrons, and their names were Anna Bianchini and Fillide Melandroni. Anna Bianchini appeared first as a solitary Mary Magdalene in the Penitent Magdalene of about 1597. Fillide Melandroni appeared in a secular Portrait of a Courtesan done the same year for Del Monte's friend and fellow art-lover, the banker Vincenzo Giustiniani. In 1598 Caravaggio painted Fillide again as Saint Catherine, capturing a beauty full of intelligence and spirit. In Martha and Mary the two are shown together, Fillide perfectly fitted to the role of Mary, Anna to the mousier but insistent presence as Martha.
A finely grained cream-brown table running in front of the sisters displays three objects, of which a Venetian mirror is the most obvious. It reflects the Magdalen's hand and a rectangular window, to which reflection her middle finger points. The other two objects are an ivory comb and a dish with a sponge. The type of dish was called a sponzarol by the Venetians and, in this case, is made of alabaster.Mary wears red, the colour of the Magdalen, and a dress very similar to one Caravaggio employs in his Portrait of a Courtesan (1597) and Saint Catherine (1598), with embroidery on the blouse, similar to what we see in his Penitent Magdalen.
Ecstasy of Saint Francis Rest on the Flight into Egypt Penitent Magdalene The Musicians Caravaggio Saint Catherine Vincenzo Giustiniani Portrait of a Courtesan alabaster Bacchus New Testament The Lute Player Fillide Melandroni courtesans Anna Bianchini Martha Penitent Magdalen