“Caravaggio's Basket. Secrets and enigmas of Still Life" is the extraordinary exhibition which, starting from 25 November 2023 until 7 April 2024, at Palazzo Mazzetti in Asti will see the undisputed protagonist of Merisi's famous masterpiece exceptionally lent by the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana in Milan.

A unique exhibition of its kind which - curated by the art historian Costantino D'Orazio - recounts the birth and evolution over time of Still Life, a pictorial genre which, in the entire history of Italian art, was inaugurated by Caravaggio precisely with his famous Basket of Fruit (1597-1600). From a Caravaggio at the beginning of his career the work was acquired by Cardinal Federico Borromeo at the end of the sixteenth century and then donated by the same Milanese prelate to the Ambrosiana Library in 1607.

The success of this painting was so immediate as to produce the birth of a genre, which in the exhibition will be investigated through over twenty precious canvases lent by prestigious private collections - such as the Pallavicini collection and the Cremonini collection - and by various important museums (from the Galleria Borghese alla Venaria Reale), significant examples belonging both to the iconography preceding the Canestra and painted after the appearance of Caravaggio's "fiscella".

The exhibition, with the contribution granted by the General Directorate of Education, Research and Cultural Institutes of the Ministry of Culture, is organized by the Asti Musei Foundation, the Cassa di Risparmio di Asti Foundation, the Piedmont Region and the Municipality of Asti, with the contribution of the Foundation Cassa di Risparmio di Torino, in collaboration with Arthemisia, with the patronage of the Province of Asti, sees the Cassa di Risparmio di Asti Group as sponsor.