There are many Renaissance artists who had a large impact on what was then the Each of these artists had some-what interesting lives. Although many artists of the Renaissance time had interesting lives, Michelangelo Merisi, who was called Caravaggio, had the most interesting and turbulent life.Caravaggio, was born in Milan in during the late summer or early autumn of 1571. His parents, Fermo Merisi, and Lucia Aratori, had been married on January 14 of that same year. He was the first of their four children. For several generations the Mersi family had lived in the small town of Caravaggio. Caravaggio probably adapted the town name as his own when he left for Rome(Friedlaender 34 38). His father worked as a builder for the Marchese of Caravaggio. Caravaggio lived with his family in Milan until the age of five, but by 1576 he had been sent back home to Caravaggio to escape the menace of the plague in the city. The rest of the family followed the next year, in October Caravaggios father past away(Dict. Of Art 702 704).. Caravaggio probably had more than an average education. He was taught to read, write, and do sums. He may also have learned Latin. His artistic education began that April, 1584, when he became the apprentice for Simone Peterzano. Simone was a Compitant Milanese painter who was moderately successful, but so undistinguished that he would hardly be remembered except for his apprentice. Caravaggio learned how to paint in oil, and fresco, he also learned anatomy and prospective, and the basics of light, shadow, and space, and the use of color(Moir 21) . Some of Caravaggios experiences in Milan may have been unwholesome. It was a notably lawless city, and an adolescent artist may have acquired a taste for violence. The most reliable of his seventeenth century biographers, Giovanni Petro Bellori, alleges that some criminal difficulty forced him to flee the city, yet nothing is said of that in the Milan po...
