Martha and Mary Magdalene

Martha leans in, counting arguments on her fingers; Mary listens with one hand on a convex mirror — vanity's prop, about to be given up. Caravaggio paints conversion not as lightning but as a conversation between sisters, half of it in shadow. The model for Mary was Fillide Melandroni, painted by him more than once; the light, as always with Caravaggio, does the theology.