Gianni Papi, Caravaggio Expert, says that Boy peelingsaid “Mondafrutto”, would be the oldest known painting of the painter. The oil on canvas of 66 cm by 51.5 cm represents a young boy peeling fruit on a table, in front of a neutral and dark background. Acquired in 2024, this copy, among the ten existing dozen made most often by caravading students, was bought by an anonymous collector during an auction in northern Europe.
Presented as a copy of the “Mondafrutto”, the painting was the subject of an expertise commissioned by the collector who thought it was the original. Gianni Papi, art historian and specialist in the painter, after a stylistic study, a study of provenance, radiography and a reflectography, concluded that it was indeed the original painted by caravan.
These analyzes revealed under the pictorial layer the presence of a dog – undoubtedly Cornacchia, that of the artist – as well as a landscape, signs of a reuse of the canvas. This was then detained on three edges. These elements suggest that it would not be a copy, but the original. This hypothesis is also based on the treatment of shadows of the dog’s head, reworked in other known versions. The fruits would come from the Lombard iconography, suggesting a realization before the arrival of the painter in Rome.
The study of Provenance indicates that the table would have belonged to the rider of Arpin and the Cardinal Scipio Borghese, like several works of youth of the painter.
Copies of Boy peeling are scattered all over the world; Most belonging to private collections. One of the best known is in the royal collections in London. There are others in a private collection in Tokyo, at the Roberto Longhi Foundation, or in a private Roman collection. Gianni Papi is preparing a book on the “Mondafrutto” and intends to publish articles on this authentication.
Economic issues are always very important for caravan tables, which explains their media coverage when discovering new paintings. A work found in an attic in Toulouse in 2014, Judith and Holophernewas estimated between 100 and 150 million euros. Very recently in 2021, Spain blocked the sale of the table The coronation of thornsattributed to Caravaggio, authenticity confirmed in 2024 after several years of research by the Prado Museum in Madrid.
