Caravaggio, in his work, had a continual conflict between what was termed 'vulgar realism'and the expectations of the person or body who comissioned the work.
An example of this is the painting of St Matthew.
Caravaggio's first painting of St Matthew was rejected. In this first painting he presented the saint as a bald peasant, with dirty legs and attended by a lightly clad, over familiar boy angel.
The church did not accept this and he redid-it.
The first painting was realism as Caravaggio knew it, since it was not the first time he found himself in a situation of poverty.
Caravaggio realism for which he became renounced showed up as early as his apprenticeship with Giuseppe Cesare, where his paintings showed physical particularity.
Caravaggio never resolved this conflict, since his art, more often than not reflected his life, and so his paintings show violent struggles, grotesque decapitations, torture and death, and only when the original paintings were rejected did he consent to repaint in a more idealistic style, "the stylised formality and grandeur"of Roman Mannerism.
available at: http://www.caravaggio-foundation.org/[Accessed 22nd December 2012]
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