Boy Peeling Fruit, c.1592-3 (oil on canvas)

Caravaggio was probably the most influential painter of the early seventeenth century. This may be his earliest surviving painting, dating from his first years in Rome. Here we see Caravaggio's interest in recording reality, with posed model and still life, which was to continue throughout his career. There are a handful of references in contemporary sources to this composition, which dates from Caravaggio's early struggling years in Rome. One of the first paintings mentioned in Mancini's biography is a 'boy peeling a pear with a knife' (in later editions the fruit becomes an apple). There is also a record of an unattributed painting of a 'young boy seated at a table with an apple in his hand' confiscated in 1607 from Cavaliere d'Arpino's studio and given by Pope Paul V to his nephew, Cardinal Scipione Borghese. This painting does not appear in the 1693 inventory of the Borghese collection. A letter of the 16 August 1608 from Lorenzo Sarego in Perugia to Cardinal Scipione Borghese mentions a half-length painting of a boy peeling a peach by Caravaggio, which had turned up in the estate of the Perugian collector Cesare Crispolti. From these records it appears either that Caravaggio painted several versions of this composition or others, perhaps from within his circle, made copies or variants of them. Today at least ten versions survive, all showing the peeling of a green Seville or Bergamot orange (rather than an apple, peach or pear), with other fruit scattered on the table - peaches, cherries and nectarines. They belong with a group of quite small paintings dated c.1593-7, all depicting half-length youths against simple backgrounds, evocatively lit, with prominent still lifes in the foreground; other examples include the Self-portrait as Bacchus and Boy with a Basket of Fruit (both Galleria Borghese, Rome) and the Boy Bitten by a Lizard (National Gallery, London and Longhi collection, Florence). Caravaggio's typically Lombard interest in recording reality as it was set in front of him, with posed model and still life, was to continue throughout his career. The awkwardness of the figure here compared with the Boy Bitten by a Lizard or Boy with a Basket of Fruit suggests that this is Caravaggio's earliest surviving painting.