During the 15th and 16th centuries, Europe was undergoing a Renaissance, where a newfound appreciation for antiquity allowed artists to express the idealized virtues of a transforming society. As the Renaissance period gave way to the Baroque, themes of humanism and naturalism remained strong. Still, a new wave of artists rejected the typical bombast of established masters for subdued depictions of their subjects. This episode examines Michelangelo Merisi da Caravaggio’s 17th-century painting Conversion on the Way to Damascus. It fits the shift between Renaissance and Baroque and addresses criticism from later influential art critics and cultural historians.