Supper at Emmaus

At the instant the risen Christ blesses the bread, the two disciples who took him for a stranger suddenly know him: one grips his chair to rise, the other flings his arms wide, and a basket of fruit teeters on the very edge of the table toward our space. Caravaggio freezes the recognition at Emmaus (Luke 24) as an explosion of gesture, the beardless Christ lit from the side, the still life almost falling into the room. Now in London's National Gallery, it turns a quiet Gospel meal into a jolt of revelation.