Caravaggio, The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew: the saint bound to an upright cross as a man pulls at the rope on his wrist and onlookers gather below
Look closer: three details in this image
  1. The cross Andrew is bound to an upright cross, rather than the later familiar X shape.
  2. The rope The man at left works at the binding in an attempted release, according to Cleveland’s account.
  3. The onlookers Figures below the cross bring the viewer near the event.
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Tom Gurney BSc (Hons) is an art history expert with over 20 years experience
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The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew by Caravaggio

Andrew is bound to an upright cross. A man strains at the rope on his wrist, while people below look up. The movement might first appear to be part of the execution, but the Cleveland Museum of Art identifies it as an attempt to untie the saint after a crowd pleaded for his release. In Caravaggio's Crucifixion of Saint Andrew, the effort to save him comes too late: the story holds both public sympathy and Andrew's resolve to die as a martyr.[1]

Painted in Naples in 1606–07, the canvas is now in the Cleveland Museum of Art. The owner calls it the only Caravaggio altarpiece in America. It is large enough for a chapel, yet the figures are pressed close to the viewer. The ordinary vertical cross, the rope, and the faces below make this particular version of Andrew's death more precise than a generic picture of martyrdom.[1][2]

Caravaggio in context

At a Glance

  • ArtistMichelangelo Merisi, called Caravaggio (1571–1610)
  • TitleThe Crucifixion of Saint Andrew
  • Date1606–07[1]
  • Mediumoil on canvas[1]
  • Dimensions202.5 × 152.7 cm unframed[1]
  • CollectionCleveland Museum of Art, 1976.2[1]
  • Place of makingNaples[1]
  • Subjectthe attempted release of Saint Andrew from his cross before his martyrdom[1]
  • Distinctive detaila vertical cross, although Andrew is often pictured on an X-shaped one[1]

Contents

  1. What Moment Does the Painting Show?
  2. Andrew, the Rope and the Cross
  3. The Onlookers and the Viewer
  4. Light and Bodily Scale
  5. The Viceroy and the Painting's Journey to Spain
  6. Rediscovery and Departure from Spain
  7. What Conservation Can Tell Us
  8. The Cleveland Original and Other Versions
  9. Andrew's Story and Other Caravaggio Crucifixions
  10. Frequently Asked Questions

Look closer: The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew

The cross fills the upper painting while workers and onlookers crowd below. These views distinguish Andrew’s body from the efforts and reactions around it.

Full view of The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew for close reading123
Details made from a high-resolution reproduction (2,563 × 3,400 pixels). [13]

Details from The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew

Select a detail image to open the full-size gallery, then use the arrows to compare views.

1

Andrew on the cross

Andrew stretches across the beam, his exposed torso and turned face lit against the dark timber.

Andrew on the cross
2

The worker at the left

A worker grips the cross with both hands, his back and twisting cloth forming a counterweight to Andrew’s body.

The worker at the left
3

Onlookers below

Faces rise toward Andrew from the lower edge, where a dark suit of armour cuts through the crowd.

Onlookers below

What Moment Does the Painting Show?

The Cleveland Museum's account tells Andrew's martyrdom story as a sequence. Condemned for refusing to honour pagan gods, Andrew preached while bound to the cross. The crowd became sympathetic and pressed for him to be released. Men tried to untie him, but their hands were prevented from completing the task, and Andrew died there. Caravaggio chooses that attempted release rather than the first moment of binding.[1]

The choice makes the main action visually ambiguous until the story is known. The man at the left pulls or works at the rope near Andrew's wrist. Looking only at his effort, a viewer might read him as an executioner. The owner record changes that first impression: his movement is an attempt to undo the binding. Caravaggio can hold the threat of violence and a gesture of mercy in the same posture.[1]

Andrew's body hangs in the centre, illuminated against a dark field. His head inclines downward. The figures below are close enough that he seems to meet their eyes. The picture does not spread the crowd across a distant public square. It selects a handful of people and turns the episode into an encounter within arm's reach.

Andrew, the Rope and the Cross

Andrew's wrists are tied to a standard vertical cross. The Cleveland Museum calls attention to this detail because the saint is often associated with an X-shaped cross. The difference is important for both identification and visual reading: the horizontal beam stretches his arms wide and gives the rescuer a clear point to reach. This is Caravaggio's depicted cross, regardless of the form that later popular iconography might lead a visitor to expect.[1]

The rope does much of the narrative work. At one wrist it marks Andrew's confinement; in the other man's hands it becomes an object of attempted release. The same material carries opposing meanings depending on who holds it. Caravaggio makes the story legible through a practical action rather than a broad symbolic gesture.

The saint's body also differs from a weightless emblem. Age, exposed skin, strained arms and hanging feet make the cross a physical support. The red cloth around his waist introduces a strong colour near the centre without disguising his vulnerability. The body is lit enough for the viewer to see anatomy and tension, but the surrounding space remains hard to locate exactly.

The Onlookers and the Viewer

At the lower left an older woman looks up. Below and to the right, men in different dress gather, including a figure in armour. The Cleveland Museum describes a crowd becoming sympathetic to Andrew; the painting lets us examine individuals within that crowd instead of rendering it as a faceless mass.[1]

Their positions also locate the viewer. We seem to stand among or just in front of the onlookers, near the base of the cross. Andrew rises above us, but not so far that his body becomes remote. The result suits an altarpiece: the saint's suffering is presented in relation to people who witness it, including those standing before the painting.[1]

The figures' responses are not uniform. One looks upward with urgency, another appears still, and the man at the rope is physically occupied. Caravaggio gives the narrative different tempos at once: effort, attention and the saint's quiet endurance.

Light and Bodily Scale

Light falls strongly on Andrew and the man reaching for the rope. Their arms and torsos stand out against dark space. It catches the woman below and parts of the armour, allowing the viewer to move from the central action to those who watch it. The Cleveland Museum reads the light and dark contrast as suggesting divine presence. That spiritual reading grows from the painting's form but is not an invisible object depicted behind the cross.[1]

The canvas is about two metres high. That is large enough for a religious setting, yet Caravaggio has not filled it with a distant crowd or elaborate architecture. The body's near scale and the close faces make a public martyrdom feel like a smaller, private moment. The museum describes this as a distinctive way of drawing viewers into the scene.[1]

Compare the Malta Beheading of Saint John the Baptist, where a huge breadth of dark architecture surrounds a small group. Both are late violent subjects, but their spatial choices differ. In Cleveland, bodies take much of the picture's height; in Valletta, empty courtyard space makes the killing feel isolated.

The Viceroy and the Painting's Journey to Spain

The Cleveland Museum dates the painting to 1606–07 and identifies Naples as its place of making. Its conservation essay says the canvas was taken to Spain in 1610 and likely stayed there for centuries before its modern rediscovery and acquisition by Cleveland in the 1970s. The museum's own 1976.2 accession number fixes its present collection identity.[1][2]

The owner's provenance record names Don Juan Alonso Pimentel y Herrera, eighth Count of Benavente, Spanish viceroy in Naples, and then his grandson, the tenth count, in Valladolid. The canvas subsequently passed through an unidentified convent in Castile, a Madrid dealer and José Manuel Arnaiz of Madrid. Cleveland records its acquisition through Legatt Brothers on 24 February 1976.[3] These are stages of the painting's collection history, not evidence that the convent commissioned it or that its exact hanging place is known at every stage.

A catalogue created by the University of Valladolid's Nostra et Mundi research project gives two intermediate records behind that broad Spanish route. It identifies a 1611 inventory at the Benavente fortress that lists an original Saint Andrew on linen, and a 1653 inventory of the family's Valladolid palace that describes a large painting of the saint, three men and a woman. The later inventory calls it an original by Caravaggio and values the painting together with its ebony frame at 1,500 ducats. That figure is evidence of an appraisal of a framed object within one collection, not a standalone market price for Caravaggio's canvas. Nor does the historic word “original” replace the modern comparison of the surviving painting with its copies.[7]

The Valladolid description says the men are putting Andrew onto the cross. The Cleveland Museum's reading of the depicted action is different: one man is trying to untie him. This difference need not break the provenance chain. It demonstrates how an inventory could identify a picture by its saint and main action without recording the finer narrative moment that a modern curator sees in the rope. The 1611 and 1653 entries also narrow the gap between the viceroy's return from Naples and the later convent ownership, even though the transfer into that convent remains undocumented.[1][7]

The Valladolid catalogue also cites a 17 January 1653 listing, made before the fuller February appraisal. It places three men and a woman at the foot of a naked Saint Andrew on the cross. That wording helps explain why the later appraiser's “putting him on the cross” should not be treated as a precise account of the action. The catalogue reports cleaning and attention to the frame before 1658, another reminder that the framed object named in an inventory had a physical history even within the Benavente family.[7] It does not establish how or when the picture subsequently entered the unnamed convent.

Erin E. Benay, author of a Cleveland monograph on the picture, argues that it was made as an altarpiece for the viceroy's palace in Naples. She stresses how its removal to Spain changed its setting from one of devotion to one of collecting and display.[4] The association with Benavente is firm in the museum's provenance; the precise original room and commissioning circumstances are a scholarly reconstruction rather than a contract quoted in the owner record. This distinction matters when calling it an “altarpiece”: the format and proposed first use should not be confused with a surviving, identified chapel installation.

That path is useful context for a work not still in its first location. A visitor in Cleveland sees a Neapolitan religious painting with a long Spanish history. Its journey should not be mistaken for a different version of the subject. The Cleveland canvas is the object documented by the museum, and the composition with the vertical cross provides a visual check.[1][3]

Another Neapolitan work, the Seven Works of Mercy, remains in the chapel that commissioned it. Comparing the two makes location and movement part of the story: one painting stayed with its charitable institution, while the other travelled far from its original setting.

Rediscovery and Departure from Spain

The long gap in the ownership record ended with a public scholarly problem, not immediate agreement. The Valladolid catalogue reports that Xavier de Salas announced a possible Caravaggio in February 1973; the canvas, then in José Manuel Arnaiz's hands, appeared in the Seville exhibition associated with the International Congress of Art History later that year. Catalogue author Alfonso E. Pérez Sánchez put a question mark after Caravaggio's name and even questioned whether the figure could be Andrew, because the cross was upright rather than X-shaped.[7] The older Benavente inventories named Andrew, and the cross form alone could not disprove their identification.

A 1974 Swiss restoration by Jan Dik and an X-radiograph made changes to the design easier to discuss. The Valladolid catalogue reports Benedict Nicolson's subsequent argument that changes to the woman's pose and a male head supported authorship by the painter who invented the composition, rather than a copyist repeating it.[7] Such changes are important object evidence, but a pentimento is not an artist's signature: the archival trail, technical findings and comparison with other paintings all formed the eventual attribution case. Cleveland acquired the picture from Arnaiz through Legatt Brothers in February 1976.[3][7]

Spain's export board authorised the painting's departure, according to the Valladolid catalogue, which criticises the decision and the attributional uncertainty surrounding it.[7] That documented authorisation belongs to the modern history of this Cleveland canvas. It should not be confused with the separately disputed Italian export history of Caravaggio's Denial of Saint Peter, or treated as proof that Spanish specialists had all reached the same view in 1976.

What Conservation Can Tell Us

The Cleveland Museum undertook a substantial study and conservation treatment beginning in 2014 and completed in 2016. Its print record explains that an earlier 1974 treatment used layers of varnish to level surface cracks. As the underlying paint and ground moved, distracting cracks appeared in those later coatings. The newer work removed old varnish and overpaint, analysed materials and restored a more coherent view of the original paint.[3]

The museum's technical account describes dark outlines around figures, visible in infrared, and a limited palette. It identifies specific pigments in Andrew's red cloth and other garments. Such evidence can test how the painting was built and how later treatments affected what viewers see. It cannot by itself tell us how Caravaggio felt about martyrdom or why each onlooker looks as they do.[3]

Dean Yoder, the museum's painting conservator, reports more than a general examination. Infrared imaging disclosed incised guides, including a line associated with an earlier position of the older woman's arm. He also describes abbozzo, initial placement using lead-white paint, and pentimenti that show the composition developing. Cleaning brought a figure previously lost in the dark field back into legibility. Thus a person or gesture that appears absent in an older reproduction may have been concealed by later varnish rather than omitted by Caravaggio.[2]

The Cleveland project combined X-rays, infrared reflectography, ultraviolet examination, Raman spectroscopy and pigment analysis. These methods ask different questions: an X-ray can reveal changes beneath paint, while surface and material analysis help distinguish original colour from restoration layers. The museum says an older coating had contributed to blanching and cracking. The 2014–16 treatment addressed that physical problem; it was not merely a cosmetic brightening of a dark picture.[2][3]

The X-radiograph also shows that Caravaggio worked on one piece of diamond-weave linen, possibly cloth originally intended as a table covering. Cleveland identifies two brown preparatory layers: a thicker, water-bound layer over the canvas and a thinner layer bound in drying oil above it.[3] The weave and ground are findings about this physical canvas, not a general recipe for every Neapolitan Caravaggio. X-rays reveal tears and later canvas inserts as well, reminding us that the object seen now includes repairs alongside the artist's paint.[5]

Christina Young's Getty conservation study gives the weave a more precise structural description: a huckaback, a plain weave with floating warp threads that produces the visible diamond pattern. A reconstructed weave made with comparable linen behaved more stably on the diagonal and showed less edge distortion, or cusping, than a comparable simple plain weave when stretched. The original has been lined and may have been cut down, so Young cautions against using ordinary plain-weave cusping rules to calculate its first dimensions.[11] The reconstruction tests how such a fabric can behave; it does not prove that Caravaggio chose this cloth for a symbolic reason or fix the painting's lost margins.

The 2016 treatment uncovered portions of the original perimeter beneath a heavy brown border applied in earlier restoration. Cleveland used surviving islands of paint to reintegrate the edges and placed the work in a frame that reveals more of them.[6] This affects the space around the figures, not just the brightness of their faces. It also means older reproductions can make the group appear more tightly cropped than the conserved painting now does.

Conservation is especially relevant to a painting whose force depends on selective light. Discoloured varnish can obscure the gradations between lit body and dark field. The museum's documented treatment provides a material basis for discussing what is visible today rather than imagining that a reproduction is a timeless, unchanged surface.[2][3]

The Cleveland Original and Other Versions

Before its rediscovery in the 1970s, the painting was known largely through versions and records rather than direct access to this canvas. A later dispute over whether a close version might also be by Caravaggio shows why a reproduced composition alone cannot settle authorship. In 2017, Cleveland hung its original beside the so-called Back-Vega version, which it labels an unknown artist's work after Caravaggio, dated about 1608–10.[4] The latter was lent by the Spier Collection in London; Cleveland records its earlier attributions to Ribera, Louis Finson and Caravaggio.[9] The two paintings share the invention, but they are separate supports with separate histories.

Benay reports that the side-by-side comparison led most specialists to reject an autograph attribution for the Back-Vega picture. That is a reported scholarly judgment, not a unanimous verdict.[4] Gianni Papi argued in a book and later interview that Cleveland's picture is Caravaggio's first version and Back-Vega a possible autograph repetition. He explicitly rejected Richard Spear's published criticism of that proposal.[12] The debate does not displace Cleveland's secure status in its own collection. It means that calling Back-Vega simply “the copy” reports Cleveland's catalogue position rather than every specialist's conclusion. Readers comparing images should check the collection, dimensions and object history before assuming that every Crucifixion of Saint Andrew photograph records Cleveland's 1976.2.

There is also a distinct copy in the Musée des Beaux-Arts de Dijon. France's national collections catalogue labels it a copy after Caravaggio and gives its canvas dimensions as 209 × 151.5 cm, close to but not the same as Cleveland's. The Dijon record offers Louis Finson and Abraham Vinck as possible makers, not firm attributions. It notes that earlier writers called the subject the martyrdom of Simeon or Philip, and that a 1794 inventory described a good copy of a supposed Crucifixion of Saint Peter. Those changing titles are a useful warning: the unusual upright cross and a copied composition can obscure both the saint's identity and which physical painting a record describes.[8]

The same catalogue reports a proposed link between the Dijon canvas and the Back-Vega version through Finson and Vinck. It remains a hypothesis about how copies may be related, not a documented sequence in which one named artist made every surviving version. The Dijon object has its own French collection history, while Cleveland's accepted original has the Benavente inventories and the museum's conservation record. Treating each as a separate object is more reliable than using a title alone to trace Caravaggio's work.[3][4][8]

A 1619 Amsterdam sale offers evidence that another Saint Andrew composition circulated in Finson and Vinck's trading network. The Valladolid catalogue reports that dealer Pieter de With said he had bought a Crucifixion of Saint Andrew at a 1617 sale from Finson's heirs at Vinck's house, then sold it to François Seghers through an agent. The work was offered under Caravaggio's name.[7] Those documents cannot make it the Cleveland canvas: the latter is placed in the Benavente fortress in 1611 and in the family's Valladolid inventory in 1653. Whether the Amsterdam picture is identifiable with Back-Vega, Dijon or another version is a further attribution and provenance question, not settled by the subject title or the old sales label.

The Toledo Museo de Santa Cruz has a third distinct repetition. Factum Foundation recorded its worn surface in 3D and colour in December 2021, after discussions with Cleveland conservator Dean Yoder. The project proposes future comparison with the Cleveland original's surface data; the recording announcement does not publish a result that names the Toledo copyist or orders the versions.[10] Its value here is a reliable object identity and a new physical record of a damaged copy, rather than another claim to Caravaggio's authorship.

Andrew's Story and Other Caravaggio Crucifixions

The saint's attempted release is the key narrative distinction in this work. Andrew has already been condemned and bound; the crowd wants him freed; the effort fails. The vertical cross and rope give that story a precise visual form. Without the owner record, a viewer might stop at the more general label “crucifixion” and miss the reversal in the rescuer's action.[1]

Caravaggio's Crucifixion of Saint Peter is a separate Roman chapel picture with a different saint, setting and action. The comparison can illuminate how he arranges human effort around a cross, but the two works should not share images, dates or locations. The paintings directory keeps them apart; the artist guide places Cleveland within the Naples period.

Explore the Caravaggio collection

94 pages

NameDateType
Adoration of the Shepherds by Caravaggio: The Messina Nativity1608–09; precise order relative to Resurrection of Lazarus remains unresolvedArtwork
Amor Victorious by Caravaggio1601–02 in the Berlin owner recordArtwork
Bacchus by Caravaggio: The Uffizi Paintingabout 1598, according to the UffiziArtwork
Basket of Fruit by Caravaggioafter 1597, probably around the turn of the seventeenth century, according to the AmbrosianaArtwork
Boy Bitten by a Lizard: Caravaggio's London Paintingabout 1594–95 in the National Gallery's current catalogue; URL suffix “1596” is inheritedArtwork
Boy Bitten by a Lizard: The Florence Version Attributed to Caravaggiodisputed; Longhi's catalogue record preserves historical 1592–93 and other proposed ranges, including c.1597Artwork
Boy Peeling Fruit by Caravaggio: The Royal Collection Paintingabout 1592–93 in the owner's current exhibition recordArtwork
Boy Peeling Fruit in Florence: A Derivation from Caravaggio—Artwork
Boy with a Basket of Fruit by Caravaggioabout 1595 in the Galleria Borghese catalogueArtwork
Caravaggio Paintings in Rome: Churches, Museums and a Practical Route—Guide
Caravaggio Quotes: What the Documents Actually Record—Guide
Caravaggio's Lute Player: The Del Monte Painting Once Shown at the Metabout 1596–97 in the Met catalogueArtwork
Caravaggio's Painting Technique: Grounds, Incisions, Revisions and Light—Guide
Christ at the Column by Caravaggio: The Rouen Flagellationc.1606 in the owner caption; owner prose gives 1606–07Artwork
Christ on the Mount of Olives by Caravaggio: The Lost Berlin Painting—Artwork
Conversion on the Way to Damascus by Caravaggioabout 1601 in the Roma Capitale church recordArtwork
Crowning with Thorns by Caravaggio: The Vienna Paintingabout 1603 in the 2019 KHM record; “1607” is an inherited URL suffixArtwork
Crowning with Thorns in Prato: Attributed to Caravaggioabout 1602–03 in the collection presentationArtwork
David with the Head of Goliath by Caravaggio: The Borghese Painting1606–07 or 1609–10 in the Galleria Borghese catalogue; the later Naples period is favoured by many scholars, while the owner keeps the question openArtwork
David with the Head of Goliath by Caravaggio: The Prado Paintingabout 1600 in Prado material; “1599” survives only in the legacy URLArtwork
David with the Head of Goliath by Caravaggio: The Vienna Paintingabout 1600–01 in the KHM's 2019 exhibition record; “1607” is a legacy route labelArtwork
Did Caravaggio Make Drawings? What Survives and What Paintings Reveal—Guide
Ecce Homo: Caravaggio's Madrid Rediscovery and the Genoa Painting—Artwork
John the Baptist in Caravaggio's Paintings: A Guide to the Different Versions—Artwork
Judith Beheading Holofernes by Caravaggiobeginning of the seventeenth century in the owning museum's account; about 1599–1600 in the Kimbell's 2025 loan label; around 1602 in one specialist catalogueArtwork
Jupiter, Neptune and Pluto: Caravaggio's Ludovisi Ceilingabout 1597; the archive connects the work with Cardinal del Monte's 1597 commissionArtwork
Madonna and Child with Saint Anne by Caravaggio: The Palafrenieri Altarpiece1605 in the Galleria Borghese object field; completed and delivered by 8 April 1606Artwork
Madonna of Loreto by Caravaggio: The Pilgrims at Sant'Agostinobroadly c.1604–06; institutional records differ slightly in their starting yearArtwork
Madonna of the Rosary by Caravaggio: The Vienna Altarpiecearound 1603 in the Kunsthistorisches Museum's object recordArtwork
Martha and Mary Magdalene by Caravaggio: The Detroit Paintingabout 1598 in the Detroit Institute of Arts recordArtwork
Medusa by Caravaggio: The Uffizi Painted Shield1596–98 in the Uffizi's virtual exhibition; specialist research reports the shield delivered to the Medici wardrobe by 7 September 1598Artwork
Narcissus, Attributed to Caravaggiodependent on attribution; the Zeri catalogue gives a broad 1610–50 range under SpadarinoArtwork
Nativity with Saint Francis and Saint Lawrence: Caravaggio's Missing Paintingsomewhere in 1600–09 in the parliamentary report; a specific 1609 execution and place remain debatedArtwork
Penitent Mary Magdalene by Caravaggio1597 in the owner's catalogue, during Caravaggio's early Roman activityArtwork
Portrait of a Courtesan: Caravaggio's Lost Berlin PortraitBerlin's data field says c.1590, while its own text compares a Caravaggio work of c.1598; precise date unresolvedArtwork
Portrait of Alof de Wignacourt and His Page by Caravaggio—Artwork
Portrait of Fra Antonio Martelli? Caravaggio's Pitti Knight of Malta1608 in the Restituzioni object heading; within Caravaggio's Malta periodArtwork
Portrait of Maffeo Barberini: The Seated Corsini Paintingc.1596–97 in the national catalogueArtwork
Portrait of Monsignor Maffeo Barberini: Caravaggio's Newly Acquired Paintingaround the late 1590s / age thirty; “1598” in the inherited address is approximate, not an exact document dateArtwork
Portrait of Pope Paul V: A Caravaggio Attribution and a Borghese Copy—Artwork
Prints After Caravaggio: Who Made Them and What They Show—Guide
Reclining Saint John the Baptist: A Disputed Caravaggio Attributionoften proposed for the artist's final years; the later museum list does not give a precise year.Artwork
Rest on the Flight into Egypt by Caravaggioabout 1597 in the owner's catalogueArtwork
Saint Catherine of Alexandria by Caravaggio: The Thyssen Paintingabout 1598–99 in the Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza catalogueArtwork
Saint Francis in Meditation by Caravaggio: The Cremona Painting1603–06 in the owner account; c.1605–06 in a KHM exhibition captionArtwork
Saint Francis in Prayer: Caravaggio's Carpineto Painting1606 in a 2016–17 exhibition work listArtwork
Saint Francis of Assisi in Ecstasy by Caravaggioc.1595–96 in the owner wall textArtwork
Saint Jerome in Meditation: Caravaggio's Montserrat Painting1605 in the owner record; an owner publication reports scholarship placing it about 1605–06Artwork
Saint Jerome Writing by Caravaggio: The Borghese Paintingc.1606 in the owner catalogue; the “1605” URL suffix is inheritedArtwork
Saint Jerome Writing by Caravaggio: The Malta Paintingaround 1607–08; foundation dates Malaspina's commission to 1608Artwork
Saint John in the Wilderness at Toledo Cathedralexact 1598 not established by the cited cathedral account.Artwork
Saint John the Baptist at Galleria Corsini, Romeabout 1606 in the national record; older proposals ranged from the late 1590s onward.Artwork
Saint John the Baptist at the Capitoline Museums, Rome1602.Artwork
Saint John the Baptist at the Galleria Borghese1609–10 in the current Borghese record.Artwork
Saint John the Baptist at the Spring: The Bonello Painting in Maltaearly seventeenth century in the institutional account; a precise 1608 is not established there.Artwork
Saint Matthew and the Angel: Caravaggio's Lost First Altarpiece—Artwork
Salome Receives the Head of John the Baptist: Caravaggio's London Paintingabout 1609–10, likely late Naples period in the Gallery's accountArtwork
Salome with the Head of John the Baptist: Caravaggio's Madrid Painting—Artwork
Sleeping Cupid by Caravaggio: The Painting Made in Maltaabout 1608, Malta periodArtwork
Still Life with Fruit on a Stone Ledge: Is It by Caravaggio?—Artwork
Supper at Emmaus (1606): Caravaggio's Brera Painting—Artwork
The Annunciation by Caravaggio in Nancyc.1607–10 in the collection record; 1608–10 in the museum's restoration accountArtwork
The Basel Saint John the Baptist: Once Labelled Caravaggio, Now Maínoabout 1608–10 in that schedule, rather than the legacy URL's 1600.Artwork
The Beheading of Saint John the Baptist by Caravaggioabout 1608; installed in the Oratory on 29 August 1608Artwork
The Burial of Saint Lucy by Caravaggio in Syracuse1608, during Caravaggio's Syracuse stayArtwork
The Calling of Saint Matthew by Caravaggioabout 1599–1600Artwork
The Calling of Saints Peter and Andrew by Caravaggioabout 1602–04 in the Trust's object textArtwork
The Cardsharps by Caravaggioabout 1596–97 in the Kimbell's current object recordArtwork
The Conversion of Saint Paul: Caravaggio's Odescalchi Panelcommissioned in 1600; painted around 1600–01Artwork
The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew by Caravaggio1606–07Artwork
The Crucifixion of Saint Peter by Caravaggioabout 1601Artwork
The Death of the Virgin by Caravaggiocommissioned 1601; completed late 1605 or early 1606, according to the LouvreArtwork
The Denial of Saint Peter by Caravaggio1610Artwork
The Doria Pamphilj Saint John the Baptist: A Second Youth with a Ramlinked compositionally to the Capitoline 1602 picture; an exact production year for this canvas is not established by the owner pages used here.Artwork
The Entombment of Christ by Caravaggio: The Vatican Depositionabout 1600–04 in Vatican Museums publication materialArtwork
The Flagellation of Christ by Caravaggio: The Capodimonte Altarpiecearound 1607, in the first Naples periodArtwork
The Fortune Teller by Caravaggio: The Louvre Version and Its Roman Counterpart—Artwork
The Holy Family with the Infant Saint John the Baptist by Caravaggioearly 1600s in the Met catalogue; no more exact owner date asserted hereArtwork
The Incredulity of Saint Thomas by Caravaggioabout 1601 in the SPSG presentationArtwork
The Inspiration of Saint Matthew by Caravaggiousually 1602; also catalogued 1602–03, for the installed final altarpieceArtwork
The Lute Player by Caravaggio: The Hermitage Paintingabout 1596 in the Hermitage collection publication; the Hermitage Friends restoration page gives about 1595–96Artwork
The Magdalen in Ecstasy: Caravaggio, Copies and a Disputed Original—Artwork
The Martyrdom of Saint Matthew by Caravaggio1599–1600; unveiled with The Calling in 1600Artwork
The Martyrdom of Saint Ursula by Caravaggio—Artwork
The Musicians by Caravaggio1597Artwork
The Resurrection of Lazarus by Caravaggio in Messina1609; delivered 10 June 1609 in the owner accountArtwork
The Sacrifice of Isaac by Bartolomeo Cavarozzi: A Former Caravaggio Attributionabout 1615–17 in the Nicholas Hall catalogue; “1598” is an inherited URL label, not the accepted dateArtwork
The Sacrifice of Isaac by Caravaggio: The Uffizi Paintingabout 1603 in the Uffizi catalogueArtwork
The Seven Works of Mercy by Caravaggio1606–07, according to the Pio MonteArtwork
The Supper at Emmaus by Caravaggio: The London Painting1601Artwork
The Taking of Christ by Caravaggio1602Artwork
The Toulouse *Judith Beheading Holofernes*: A Caravaggio Attribution Debatec.1606–07 if identified with the recorded Naples work; that identification is debatedArtwork
Young Sick Bacchus by Caravaggioabout 1595 in the Galleria Borghese catalogueArtwork
Youth with a Ram: Why Caravaggio's Saint John Looks So Unusual—Artwork

Discussion

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Open question

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Frequently Asked Questions

Where is The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew?

It belongs to the Cleveland Museum of Art, object 1976.2. The museum's current page gives its display location.[1]

When was it painted?

The Cleveland Museum dates it to 1606–07 and identifies Naples as its place of making.[1]

Why is Andrew on a straight cross rather than an X-shaped one?

The museum explicitly notes that Caravaggio depicted a standard vertical cross, despite Andrew's familiar association with an X-shaped cross. The article follows the actual Cleveland painting.[1]

Is the man pulling the rope executing Andrew?

The Cleveland Museum's narrative identifies an attempt to untie Andrew after the crowd demanded his release. The man's action can look ambiguous until that story is known.[1]

Has the painting been restored?

Yes. The museum studied and conserved it between 2014 and 2016, addressing problems caused in part by an earlier varnish treatment and documenting its materials and technique.[2][3]

References

  1. Cleveland Museum of Art, The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew, 1976.2.
  2. Cleveland Museum of Art, Dean Yoder, “Conserving Caravaggio's Crucifixion of Saint Andrew”.
  3. Cleveland Museum of Art, full object and conservation record.
  4. Cleveland Museum of Art, interview with Erin E. Benay on Exporting Caravaggio and the Back-Vega comparison, 2018.
  5. Cleveland Museum of Art, “Caravaggio in Focus”, technical account of the canvas, incisions and earlier repairs, 2014.
  6. Cleveland Museum of Art, “Restored Caravaggio Masterpiece On View May 17”, 2016 treatment findings on the picture's edges and preparatory layers.
  7. University of Valladolid and Fundación Castilla y León, Nostra et Mundi catalogue, “The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew,” with 1611 and 1653 inventory references.
  8. French Ministry of Culture, POP/Joconde record 01370006162, Dijon copy of The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew.
  9. Cleveland Museum of Art, “Seeing Double at the CMA: Caravaggio's Crucifixion of Saint Andrew and the ‘Back-Vega’ Copy”, 2017.
  10. Factum Foundation, “A Copy of Caravaggio's Crucifixion of St Andrew,” Toledo surface recording, December 2021.
  11. Christina Young, “Canvas Complexity: The Life of a Complex Composite,” in Conserving Canvas, Getty Conservation Institute, section “Reconstructing Weaves.”
  12. Gianni Papi, interview on the Back-Vega attribution and Richard Spear's objection, About Art Online, December 2018.
  13. Annotated image source: Cleveland Museum of Art, The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew, collection image, high-resolution reproduction used for the annotated details.

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