One of Caravaggio’s most famous works—Victorious Cupid (1601-02)—will be shown in the UK for the first time next year at the Wallace Collection in London (26 November 2025-12 April 2026).
The painting, usually housed at the Gemäldegalerie in Berlin, will be the centrepiece in a free display featuring other works such as Love Triumphant, a statue after an 18th century original by Jean-Pierre Tassaert. Caravaggio’s provocative painting, also known as Amor Vincit Omnia, shows Cupid, the Roman god of desire, in a mischievous pose wearing dark eagle wings and holding two arrows.
The director of the Wallace Collection, Xavier Bray, described the loan of the work as “historic”. He continued: “Amor Vincit Omnia is one of Caravaggio’s masterpieces, painted at the height of his powers.. It is the first time this thought-provoking work has been shown in the UK, and it will be a once in a life time opportunity for the public to see this picture free-of-charge.”
Writing in The Guardian, the critic Jonathan Jones says: “The full-frontal menace of Caravaggio’s boldest painting creates one of art’s most unsettling encounters. Cupid is a real youth, modelled, it was said in the 17th century, after his own boyfriend ‘that lay with him’.” Other commentators claim that the boy in the picture is the artist’s apprentice, Cecco, who like Caravaggio, was involved in violent misdemeanours.
The music manuscript seen on the floor of the painting shows a large V in the margin of the right-hand page. “Scholars believe this acknowledges Marchese Vincenzo Giustiniani (1564-1537), who commissioned the painting. Giustiniani was a scion of a Genoese banking family and the embodiment of a Renaissance Man; he had trained as an architect and was well-travelled, alongside being an elegant essayist and an accomplished musician,” says a Wallace statement.
Caravaggio, dubbed the Baroque bad boy, is a guaranteed crowd pleaser. His final known painting, The Martyrdom of Saint Ursula (1610), was shown at the National Gallery in London earlier this year, drawing substantial crowds.
