06 works, Today, November 30th, is Andrew the Apostle's day, his story, illustrated #333

Caravaggio  (1571–1610)

Detail; The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew, c. 1607

Oil on canvas

Height: 202.5 cm (79.7 in); Width: 152.7 cm (60.1 in)

The Cleveland Museum of Art

Andrew the Apostle was an apostle of Jesus, according to the New Testament. He is the brother of Saint Peter. He is referred to in the Orthodox tradition as the First-Called.

According to Orthodox tradition, the apostolic successor to Saint Andrew is the Patriarch of Constantinople.

Andrew the Apostle was born between AD 5 and AD 10 in Bethsaida, in Galilee. The New Testament states that Andrew was the brother of Simon Peter, and likewise a son of John, or Jonah. He was born in the village of Bethsaida on the Sea of Galilee. 

Caravaggio, (1571–1610)

The Calling of Saints Peter and Andrew, c. 1603 / 1606

Oil on canvas

Height: 140.1 cm (55.1 in); Width: 176 cm (69.2 in)

Buckingham Palace

Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio (29 September 1571 in Caravaggio – 18 July 1610) was an Italian painter active in Rome, Naples, Malta, and Sicily between 1592 and 1610. His paintings, which combine a realistic observation of the human state, both physical and emotional, with a dramatic use of lighting, had a formative influence on Baroque painting.

Caravaggio trained as a painter in Milan under Simone Peterzano who had himself trained under Titian. In his twenties Caravaggio moved to Rome where there was a demand for paintings to fill the many huge new churches and palazzos being built at the time. It was also a period when the Church was searching for a stylistic alternative to Mannerism in religious. Caravaggio's innovation was a radical naturalism that combined close physical observation with a dramatic use of chiaroscuro which came to be known as tenebrism (the shift from light to dark with little intermediate value).

He gained attention in the art scene of Rome in 1600 with the success of his first public commissions, the Martyrdom of Saint Matthew and Calling of Saint Matthew. Thereafter he never lacked commissions or patrons, yet he handled his success poorly. He was jailed on several occasions, vandalized his own apartment, and ultimately had a death sentence pronounced against him by the Pope after killing a young man, possibly unintentionally, on May 29, 1606. He fled from Rome with a price on his head. He was involved in a brawl in Malta in 1608, and another in Naples in 1609. This encounter left him severely injured. A year later, at the age of 38, he died under mysterious circumstances in Porto Ercole in Tuscany, reportedly from a fever while on his way to Rome to receive a pardon.

Famous while he lived, Caravaggio was forgotten almost immediately after his death, and it was only in the 20th century that his importance to the development of Western art was rediscovered. More on Caravaggio

Both he and his brother Peter were fishermen by trade, hence the tradition that Jesus called them to be his disciples by saying that he will make them "fishers of men". 

Duccio di Buoninsegna, Sienese, c. 1250/1255 - 1318/1319

The Calling of the Apostles Peter and Andrew, 1308-1311

Tempera on panel

 42.7 × 45.5 cm (16 13/16 × 17 15/16 in.)

National Gallery of Art and Sculpture, Washington DC

This small panel was part of the Maestà, one of the most important masterpieces in the history of Western painting. The monumental Maestà was a two-sided altarpiece that dominated the main altar in Siena’s cathedral for nearly two centuries. 

Simon Peter and Andrew were both called together to become disciples of Jesus and "fishers of men". More on this work

Duccio di Buoninsegna (1255–1260 – c. 1318–1319) was an Italian painter active in Siena, Tuscany, in the late 13th and early 14th century. He was hired throughout his life to complete many important works in government and religious buildings around Italy. Duccio is considered one of the greatest Italian painters of the Middle Ages, and is credited with creating the painting styles of Trecento and the Sienese school. He also contributed significantly to the Sienese Gothic style.

Where Duccio studied, and with whom, is still a matter of great debate. Many believe that he studied under Cimabue, while others think that maybe he had actually traveled to Constantinople himself and learned directly from a Byzantine master.

Little is known of his painting career prior to 1278, when at the age of 23 he is recorded as having painted twelve account book cases. Although Duccio was active from 1268 to about 1311 only approximately 13 of his works survive today. More on Duccio di Buoninsegna

The Byzantine Church honours him with the name Protokletos, which means "the first called". Thenceforth, the two brothers were disciples of Christ. On a subsequent occasion, prior to the final call to the apostolate, they were called to a closer companionship, and then they left all things to follow Jesus.

Unknown artist

Saint Andrew erecting the cross on the hills of the Dnieper River; a prophecy of the city of Kiev

The Radzivill Chronicle

Russian Academy of Sciences in Saint Petersburg.

I have no further description, at this time

The Radziwiłł Chronicle is one of the Old East Slavic illuminated manuscript held by the Library of the Russian Academy of Sciences in Saint Petersburg. It is a 15th-century copy of a 13th-century original. Its name is derived from the Princes Radziwiłł of Grand Duchy of Lithuania who kept it in their Nesvizh Castle in the 17th and 18th centuries. More on the Radziwiłł Chronicle

The Christian history of Ukraine holds that the apostle Andrew preached on the southern borders of modern-day Ukraine, along the Black Sea. He travelled up the Dnieper River and reached the future location of Kyiv, where he erected a cross on the site where the Saint Andrew's Church of Kyiv currently stands, and where he prophesied the foundation of a great city.

Unknown artist

Detail of the St. Andrew Altarpiece, c. 1420-30

Made in Catalunya

The Cloisters, New York City

Andrew preached in Scythia. the lands north-east of Europe and the northern coast of the Black Sea. The Chronicle of Nestor adds that he also preached along the Black Sea and the Dnieper river as far as Kiev, and that from there he travelled to Novgorod. Hence, he became a patron saint of Ukraine, Romania and Russia. Andrew also preached in Thrace, and his presence in Byzantium is mentioned in the apocryphal Acts of Andrew. According to tradition, he founded the See of Byzantium, later Constantinople and Istanbul, in AD 38, installing Stachys as bishop. This diocese would later develop into the Patriarchate of Constantinople. 

Mattia Preti, (1613–1699)

The crucifixion of St Andrew, circa 1651

Oil on canvas

Height: 133 mm (5.23 in); Width: 97 mm (3.81 in)

Art Gallery of South Australia

Mattia Preti (24 February 1613 – 3 January 1699) was an Italian Baroque artist who worked in Italy and Malta. He was appointed a Member of the Order of Saint John.

Born in the small town of Taverna in Calabria, Preti was called Il Cavalier Calabrese after appointment as a Knight of the Order of St. John (Knights of Malta) in 1660. His early apprenticeship is said to have been with the "Caravaggist" Giovanni Battista Caracciolo, which may account for his lifelong interest in the style of Caravaggio.

Probably before 1630, Preti joined his brother Gregorio in Rome. In Rome, he painted fresco cycles. Between 1644 and 1646, he may have spent time in Venice, but remained based in Rome until 1653. 

During most of 1653–1660, he worked in Naples, where he was influenced by  Luca Giordano. One of Preti's masterpieces were a series of large frescoes, ex-votos of the plague depicting the Virgin or saints delivering people from the plague.

Having been made a Knight of Grace in the Order of St John, he visited the order’s headquarters in Malta in 1659 and spent most of the remainder of his life there. Preti transformed the interior of St. John's Co-Cathedral in Valletta with a huge series of paintings on the life and martyrdom of St. John the Baptist (1661–1666). 

Preti was fortunate to enjoy a long career and have a considerable artistic output. His paintings, representative of the exuberant late Baroque style, are held by many great museums. More on Mattia Preti

Andrew is said to have been martyred by crucifixion at the city of Patras in Achaea, in AD 60. The iconography of the martyrdom of Andrew shows him bound to an X-shaped cross.

Caravaggio  (1571–1610)

The Crucifixion of Saint Andrew, c. 1607

Oil on canvas

Height: 202.5 cm (79.7 in); Width: 152.7 cm (60.1 in)

The Cleveland Museum of Art

For in formation on Caravaggio please see above

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