Caravaggio's Basket of Fruit at the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana

Caravaggio's 'Canestra di Frutta' (c. 1599) is displayed alone in the Biblioteca Federiciana of the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana in Milan. The museum, founded in 1618 by Cardinal Federico Borromeo, houses works from the 15th to 19th centuries, including pieces by Bernardino Luini, Botticelli, Jan Brueghel, Paul Bril, and the Codex Atlanticus by Leonardo da Vinci (donated in 1637 by Marchese Galeazzo Arconati). Borromeo, a Counter-Reformation advocate, valued art that conveyed emotion and religious narrative. The still life, featuring fruits with a worm-eaten apple and withered leaves, symbolizes human mortality and sin. Borromeo wrote in his 'Musaeum' that the painting was so beautiful it deserved to hang alone, without any companion piece.