Caravaggio

From what I can find, this was painted while he was still wanted for killing a man years earlier, waiting on a pardon that never came in time — some people who write about this see Peter's denial as an odd echo of his own situation, though that's speculation, not something he ever said himself.

He made this in Malta while trying to get himself accepted as a Knight of St John — he'd run from Rome after killing a man and badly needed protection. It worked for about a year before they threw him out again. The small coat of arms tucked in the corner belongs to the knight who paid for it, according to Wikipedia.

It was painted for a side chapel and, according to Wikipedia, it was his first proper public commission — the job that made his name overnight. He put everyone in the clothes of his own day instead of anything biblical, which supposedly didn't go down well with all of the people paying for it.

They say the cardinal who commissioned this kept Caravaggio living in his own household — patrons like that collected talented people the way others collected art.

Putting fruit on its own, with no story around it, was apparently a fairly new thing to do — fruit usually turned up in the corner of a picture about something else. People also point out that the leaves are blotchy and one apple has a wormhole; nobody seems sure whether that was deliberate or just what happened to be on the table that day.

I couldn't track down who commissioned this one, but paintings like this were usually meant for a private chapel or a bedroom, not a church altar where everyone could see it.

It's the doubting Thomas story — the apostle who said he wouldn't believe the resurrection until he'd put his hand in the wound himself. A rich Roman collector paid for it, apparently, and it later bounced through a royal collection and somehow came through the Second World War without a scratch.

Caravaggio painted the fruit with real bruises and worm holes, they say, instead of prettying it up like most painters did then — some think that basket's actually the point, not the boy.

According to the story behind this, the men sent to take him down from the cross found their hands mysteriously paralyzed, so he ended up dying there anyway — not exactly the ending anyone had planned.

This was commissioned for a Naples charity that apparently still exists today, and instead of splitting the seven acts of mercy into separate scenes like usual, all seven got crammed into one dark room.

According to the myth this comes from, he fell for his own reflection and couldn't tear himself away — stared until he wasted away by the water. Apparently there's been debate for years over whether this one's actually by Caravaggio at all.

This one was made for a cardinal, from what I've read - and apparently some of the fruit in the bowl is already turning, which people take as a nod to how fast all this will fade.