| Portrait of Maffeo Barberini | |
|---|---|
| Italian: Ritratto di Maffeo Barberini | |
 | |
| Artist | Caravaggio |
| Year | c. 1598 |
| Medium | Oil on canvas |
| Dimensions | 124 cm× 90 cm(49 in× 35 in) |
| Location | Private collection |
Portrait of Maffeo Barberini (c. 1598) is a painting by the Italian Baroque master Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio. First cataloged in 1963 by Roberto Longhi, one of Italy's foremost 20th-century art historians, the painting had been in a private collection for decades, largely inaccessible to scholars, and had not been featured in any of the major Caravaggio exhibitions. [1] In November 2024, the painting went on display at the Palazzo Barberini. [2]
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Barberini, 30 years old and from the eminent Florentine Barberini family, was a rapidly rising Church prelate, a friend of Caravaggio's patron Cardinal Francesco Maria del Monte, and himself a poet and patron of the arts. Barberini's support continued – in 1603 he commissioned a Sacrifice of Isaac from Caravaggio. In 1623 he became Pope as Urban VIII.
