ABSTRACT
In 1591, Giuseppe Cesari d'Arpino was commissioned to paint the rest of the chapel in fresco. Cesari's important commissions left him no time for San Luigi, and when the Contarelli Chapel was opened for services in May 1599 it must have been essentially bare of figural adornment, apart from the frescoes in the vault. Perhaps at first Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio thought of painting on the wall in fresco, as custom dictated and as Girolamo Muziano and Cesari might have done. Since Caravaggio was now painting full-length figures, he used the opportunity to make a moral contrast between the secular, almost dancing legs and feet of the mundane people around the table and the sober stance and garb of the barefoot Christians. The costumes of the figures reflect Caravaggio's desire to show the worldly men as modern, whereas the robes of Christ and the Apostle, red and dark green, are vaguely holy and antique.
