The Borghese Gallery - Bernini, Caravaggio & Raphael

Extended Description

We’ll be honest: People who thought they were all “art-ed out” before they got to the Borghese leave our tour… stunned and enthralled! The beautiful art here, by masters as famous as Caravaggio, Bernini and Raphael, is one thing. But the incredible stories behind how these pieces came to be? That’s quite another!

Built by Cardinal Scipione Borghese in the early 17th century to show off his extraordinary art collection, the Borghese Gallery—set in one of Rome’s loveliest and largest parks—is, quite simply, beautiful. The interior, though, is filled with gem after gem. Here’s where you’ll find some of the world’s best ancient Roman and Greek pieces, including mosaics depicting actual gladiators in combat (especially fun if you’ve seen the Colosseum!) and a mysterious sleeping hermaphrodite. 

But it’s not all ancient art: In fact, some of the world’s most famous Renaissance artists are here. Like Raphael. One of his best paintings in the Borghese is the “Entombment,” a moving depiction of the grieving, including Christ’s mother, around his lifeless body. But your guide will let you in on the story that makes this piece even more moving: The matriarch of a powerful family in Perugia commissioned it from Raphael. After her son had, in a bid for power, killed most of his family members and then sought refuge in his mother’s home, she turned him away. She changed her mind a few minutes later and ran after him… just in time to see him brutally murdered by his enemies. After that story, the theme of a mother grieving over her dead son takes on a whole new dimension! 

Along with collecting (and sometimes simply stealing!) art, Cardinal Borghese hired artists to create pieces especially for him. One of his favorites? Baroque bad-boy Caravaggio. This artist, who was arrested numerous times—for every crime from brawling, to throwing a plate of artichokes in his waiter’s face, to, in 1606, killing a man—produced darkly dramatic, realistic paintings that were light-years ahead of his time. And, as your guide will reveal to you, a secret lurks within each one.

Take Caravaggio’s painting of David and Goliath. David looks at the severed head with anything but triumph. He looks sick to his stomach, uncertain, the way someone who actually committed murder would look. How does Caravaggio know the feeling? The painting was done after he committed his own murder, and that might explain the fact that he painted his own self-portrait… on the severed head of Goliath!

Another of Borghese’s favorites? Bernini. The Baroque sculptor, later famous for his baldacchino and colonnade at St. Peter’s, started working for Borghese as a young teen! But you’d never know his sculptures at the Borghese, which are some of the best he ever created, were done so young. In fact, when the painter looked at his incredibly moving “Apollo and Daphne” as a man in his 70s, he said sadly, “I should have just stopped there.” That piece was done in his mid-20s! 

And even if you’ve been to Florence and seen Michelangelo’s version, you haven’t seen a “David” like Bernini’s. His young hero twists to meet the giant, his face determined, slingshot about to spring. Here’s another secret your guide will let you in on: that look of determination on his face? It was actually the same expression Bernini’s own face had as he was sculpting… and Bernini’s own self-portrait! (He used a mirror as he worked). And, perhaps, he was expressing that he was determined to take on Michelangelo’s more famous “David.” That’s one interpretation—but because your group is so small (12 people, max!), everyone can share their own. 

Entertained by your guide, and by the jaw-dropping stories that lay behind all of these works of art, you’re not just “viewing” art; you’re experiencing art. And, whether you think you “love art” or not, we promise: After this tour, you will love the Borghese—and probably Bernini, Caravaggio and Raphael, too.