Caravaggio - Love Conquers All (Victorious Cupid) (1602)

Title: Amor Vincit Omnia (Love Conquers All or Victorious Cupid)
Artist: Caravaggio (1571-1610)
Date: 1602
Medium: Oil on canvas
Dimensions: 156 × 113 cm
Location: Gemäldegalerie, Berlin State Museums, Berlin, Germany
Photo credit: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie / Jörg P. Anders

Caravaggio’s "Amor Vincit Omnia" or “Love Conquers All” shows a life-size Cupid, completely nude, set against a deep, almost black background. He’s not a sweet idealized cherub but a wiry adolescent boy with tousled hair, dark eagle wings and a crooked, knowing grin. He half-sits, half-clambers down from a table or ledge, legs spread and body twisting in a bold, unstable pose that pushes him right into the viewer’s space. The harsh, raking light picks out every muscle, vein, and crease of skin, so he feels intensely physical and present, almost like a real boy caught in the studio rather than an idealized god.

Around and beneath him lies many objects representing all one can accomplish in a lifetime: a violin and lute with sheet music, a celestial globe, armor and helmet, a laurel wreath, crown and scepter, as well as square, compasses, and writing materials. These objects stand for the arts, war, power, learning, and exploration—everything people strive for in culture and politics.

The scene illustrates Virgil’s famous line "omnia vincit amor; et nos cedamus amori" which means “love conquers all; let us yield to love”, while also alluding to the refined interests of the patron, Marchese Vincenzo Giustiniani, a collector of music, science, and classical culture whose initial “V” appears on the music sheet.

Caravaggio uses his usual techniques of radical naturalism and tenebrism or chiaroscuro. The dense darkness makes Cupid’s body and the scattered objects pop out with sculptural force, yet nothing is idealized: his pose is cheeky and his gaze and smile are amused. The boy is totally nude and, despite his very young age, his suggestive pose may reflect a homoerotic desire by the artist and/or the patron.