Coming from the world-renowned Capitoline Museums in Rome, The Fortune Teller (1595) is one of the most highly regarded paintings by this legendary artist whose work is rarely ever seen outside of Italy. In May and early June, it will be one of the few works by Caravaggio on view anywhere in the United States. The exhibition of this masterpiece was organized by the Speed Art Museum in association with the Foundation for Italian Art & Culture (FIAC). Additional assistance was provided by the Italian Cultural Institute of New York and National Gallery of Canada. The Speed Art Museum is deeply grateful to the Capitoline Museum and Picture Gallery for making one of its most important treasures available to American art lovers.

The Fortune Teller, which depicts a Gypsy girl reading the palm of a young man as she surreptitiously slips a gold ring from his finger, will serve as the centerpiece for a small focus exhibition that demonstrates the influence of the Italian master on other artists working in Italy, Flanders, and the Netherlands during the early 17th century. Caravaggio’s insistence on heightened realism and the sculptural qualities of his figures, often brightly lit against a dark background, are evident in works from the Speed’s collection such as Gerard Douffet’s Ecce Homo, Nicolas Tournier’s Dice Players, and Hendrick van Somer’s Saint Jerome. The diffusion of Caravaggio’s style throughout Europe will be immediately apparent in the two other works included in the Louisville exhibition, both from the Speed’s collection: Rembrandt’s Portrait of a Forty-Year-Old Woman, possibly Marretje Corneliszdr. Van Grotewal and Johannes Cornelisz. Verspronck’s Portrait of a Man.

Support in Louisville has been provided by Presenting Sponsor Commonwealth Bank & Trust Company.

Media support in Louisville has been provided by WDRB TV.

Exhibition is included with general Museum admission.