Professor Butter Beard and “The Caravaggio Syndrome”
“She read books as one would breathe air, to fill up and live.” – Annie Dillard, American author.
The moment you sink down into your chair, take a deep breath, and hear the spine slightly crack as you open a new book to the title page and begin a fresh journey. I remember these moments like a birthday. “The Hobbit” – Christmas afternoon, 1977, my black bean-bag chair in my new sub-terranean bedroom. I read it from cover to cover before re-emerging for breakfast the next day. “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” – Summer of 1985, patio swing, Rochester, New York. Clive Barker’s “Imajika” – Fall of 1992, stoned beneath an apple tree in Ashfield, Massachusetts. And, Louise Penny’s “Still Life” – April of 2021, my first full-length stretch on my just-delivered sofa as I ventured forward into my newly-single life.
You know within just a few sentences if you are now fully committed to the voyage. It happened again just last weekend. Two days before, while doing laundry, I had perused the book reviews in “The Art Newspaper,” and snapped to attention when introduced to Alessandro Giardino’s “The Caravaggio Syndrome – A Novel.” Hurray for Amazon! It was on my nightstand by Friday evening and ready for my daybreak attention after Nellie’s first “wake-up” lick. Since then, I have read it twice.
“Alessandro Giardino combines the intellectual playfulness of Umberto Eco with the psychological finesse of Michael Cunningham in this fusion of historical, queer and speculative fiction,” writes Ara H. Merjian of NYU. As a tease: Headstrong art historian Leyla is expecting a baby with feckless computer technician Pablo. There’s only one problem – she can’t stand him. And one more problem – her student Michael wants Pablo for himself. But when the writings by the 17th century utopian philosopher Tommaso Campanella unlock the secret of a painting and a mystical gateway to Naples in 1606, Leyla and Michael embark on an unexpected, and karmic, voyage of self-discovery.
The painting is Caravaggio’s “The Seven Works of Mercy.”
It was the winter of 1606 when Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio arrived in Naples. Following his murder of Ranuccio Tomassoni, a youthful gangster from a wealthy Roman family, Caravaggio fled first to the estates of the Colonna family south of Rome and then on to Naples, where Costanza Colonna Sforza, widow of Francesco Sforza, in whose husband's household Caravaggio's father had held a position, maintained a palace. In Naples, outside the jurisdiction of the Roman authorities and protected by the Colonna family, the most famous painter in Rome became the most famous painter in Naples.
His connections with the Colonnas led to a stream of important church commissions, including “The Seven Works of Mercy.” The artist was contracted to depict the seven corporal works of mercy in traditional Catholic belief, which are a set of compassionate acts concerning the material needs of others. The painting was made for, and is still housed in, the church of Pio Monte della Misericordia in Naples. Originally, it was meant to be seven separate panels around the church; however, Caravaggio combined all seven works of mercy in one composition which became the church's main altarpiece.
The titulary seven works/acts of mercy are represented in the painting as follows:
“Bury the dead” - In the background, two men carry a dead man (of whom only the feet are visible). “Visit the imprisoned,” and “Feed the hungry” - On the right, a woman visits an imprisoned deputy and gives him milk from her breast. This image alludes to the classical story of Roman Charity. “Shelter the homeless” - A pilgrim (third from left, as identified by the shell in his hat) asks an innkeeper (at far left) for shelter.
“Clothe the naked” - St. Martin of Tours, fourth from the left, has torn his robe in half and given it to the naked beggar in the foreground, recalling the saint's popular legend. “Visit the sick” - St. Martin greets and comforts a beggar who is a cripple. And, “Refresh the thirsty” - Samson (second from the left) drinks water from the jawbone of an ass.
In Alessandro Giardino’s novel, our protagonist Leyla believes that every detail of the painting opens a gateway into another universe of discovery. As she studies to write her latest publication, Leyla lingers on that fateful year of 1606, in which Caravaggio, already under sentence of death, arrives in Naples at the same time that Tommaso Campanella was secretly teaching utopian philosophy through his prison cell window. She imagines a “convergence,” or “syndrome” in Greek, of the two minds - a “Caravaggio Syndrome.”
Caravaggio was the master of chiaroscuro - the use of strong contrasts between light and dark, usually bold contrasts affecting a whole composition. With my students, I always play the “just where does that light come from?” game when introducing the artist’s masterful techniques. These thoughts travelled with me into the kitchen after returning home from the Farmer’s Market with overflowing pints of the most gorgeous and delicious local blackberries. I enriched them with a hidden light source – a secret layer of golden lemon cheesecake between the lush berries and the all-butter pastry crust.
This afternoon, I cut myself a large slice, brewed a pot of Earl Grey, and seduced by the sounds of smells of a summer thunderstorm, lightly cracked the spine of my next journey, hungerly ready to “fill up and live.”
Blackberry Cheesecake Tart
One 12” Tart
3 pints fresh blackberries
1/3 cup (6 Tbsp) seedless blackberry jam
Crust:
1 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp granulated sugar
½ tsp fine sea salt
6 Tbsp unsalted butter, chilled, cut into small pieces
1 large egg
Cheesecake Filling:
½ cup granulated sugar
½ tsp fine sea salt
Zest of one lemon
8 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
1 large egg
1 tsp vanilla paste
1) Preheat your oven to 375 degrees.
2) Make and bake the crust: In a food processer, add the flour, sugar and salt. Pulse a few times to mix evenly. Add the butter pieces and pulse until the mixture resembles coarse sand. Add the egg and pulse until the dough just comes to a ball. Press the dough into a tart shell with a removable bottom. Freeze the shell for ten minutes before baking. Blind bake the shell for 20 minutes until the center appears dry and set. Cool slightly on a wire rack.
3) Make the cheesecake filling: Wipe out the food processer. Add the sugar, salt and lemon zest and pulse until evenly mixed and aromatic. Cut the cream cheese into 1” pieces and add to the sugar mix. Process until smooth. Add the egg and vanilla paste and process again until smooth. Scrape the filling into the baked tart shell.
4) Return the filled tart shell to the oven. Close the door and reduce the heat to 350 degrees. Bake 15-17 minutes until the filling is slightly puffed and just set. Remove the tart from the oven and cool completely on a wire rack.
5) Once the filling has cooled, remove the tart from the pan and spread the blackberry jam over the cheesecake filling. Arrange the blackberries over the jam, completely filling the tart. If desired, dust the top with a bit of confectionary sugar before serving.
