Study of the Medussa by Caravaggio

Last saturday, I had some time to go to the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes de Buenos Aires museum and visit the "Caravaggio y sus Seguidores" art show, that is about the italian painter Michelangelo Merisi de Caravaggio (or commonly known as "Caravaggio"), ot has original paintings by Caravaggio himself, and also from many of his followers, the show opened last August 25, I'm a big fan of Caravaggio and I consider him one of my favourite painters of all time, so I couldn't miss the chance to go, and saturday, I gave myself the LUXURY, a priviledge that is not at every draftsman's reach: to make a quick study of the "Testa di Medusa" by Michelangelo Merisi de Caravaggio in front of the ORIGINAL itself, that came out from Italy for the first time, painted in a wood shield, 1 hour standing drawing almost in total darkness... but it paid the effort every second of it.
There's something pretty cool and it's one of the most interesting things about drawing the painting from the original, and it's that it's painted over a wood shield that's pretty convex and it gives it a three-dimentionallity that, plus the natural size of the head, it makes it even more realistic, it has a perspective that I tried to capture in my drawing, and I think it shows; in this photo you can see the shape of the shield:
There was a lot of people, specially around the medussa that is considered like Caravaggio's "mona lisa", making it even more difficult for me to draw, I had to go far away and then close again all the time, there was also another painting "St. Gerome Writing", one of my favourites from Caravaggio and I really wanted to draw that one also, but after the medussa my eyes and back were hurting, and I couldn't go on anymore, but someday I'm going again to draw that painting too.
I reccomend the show to anyone interested in art and illustration because it's great, an opportunity that you don't have every day.

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Cristian Saksida is a graphic artist, concept designer, graphic arts instructor and architecture student born in december 13 of 1982, his style in all of his work (design, concept art, illustration, architecture, sculpture, etc.) features strong influences with the fantastic, using the expression of emotions and movement that exaggeration and stylization of the forms can bring.