Oil on canvas, 99 x 131 cm.
One does not have to do much stracthing to find a moral intent below the surface of most genre paintings.
Even Caravaggio's "Il Cassiere di Fortunna" teaches the obvious lesson that thosse who trust such a shady character as a gypsy might as well kiss their valuable goodbye: the enamoured youth is, in fact, losing his ring to the exotic enchantress.
The real key to the picture, however, lies not in the theme but in Caravaggio's realism, which his contemporary Gaspare Murtola understood perfectly: "You have painted the gypsy so that she seems alive; so that living and breathers, others believe her."
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