Leonardo da vinci s 18 years in milan

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1 the rewards of service leonardo da vinci and the duke of milan L U K E S Y S O N Leonardo da vinci s 18 years in milan were the making of him. 1 It was probably in 1482 that he journeyed from the mercantile republic of Florence to this, the wealthiest and most populous of Italy s dynastic city states, and he soon entered the orbit of its magnificent ruler, Ludovico Maria Sforza ( ; nicknamed il Moro the Moor probably because of his swarthy features: see cat. 2). And when, in about , Ludovico began paying Leonardo a salary, the prince was granting the painter the time and space to eωect a quite extraordinary metamorphosis of the art of painting. Leonardo s three surviving Milanese portraits (cats 5, 10, 17), not least his likeness of il Moro s mistress, Cecilia Gallerani, chronicle a stylistic journey that was to revolutionise the genre. 2 His two versions of the Virgin of the Rocks (cats 31, 32) were both painted for an elite Milanese confraternity, packed with Ludovico s courtiers. Superficially they look alike their compositions are more or less the same but in their details and hence their overall ambition they are revealed as profoundly diωerent from one another. These are disparities that reflect Leonardo s significant change of direction in the years after In 1550 Giorgio Vasari, the first great historian of art, placed Leonardo in the vanguard of what he dubbed the modern manner, notable for his force and boldness of design, the subtlest counterfeiting of all the minutiae of Nature exactly as they are, with good rule, better order, correct proportion, perfect design and divine grace. 3 Leonardo was being credited with the stylistic leap that resulted in what many art historians call the High Renaissance. This changed sense not just of what pictures might look like, but of their whole purpose and scope, is usually located in Florence during the years Leonardo spent there immediately after But of all Leonardo s works Vasari devotes most attention to the Last Supper (fig. 105), a work of almost uncanny perfection (despite its rapid decay), executed in Milan in about /8. Quite properly, Vasari gives Ludovico Sforza a leading role in the narrative of its execution. For it was actually with this picture, and as Ludovico s court painter, that Leonardo had first attained that pioneering combination of detailed naturalism, a feature already familiar from the work of Netherlandish painters and their Italian imitators, with something that is deemed new: the divine grace that with the artist seeking to surpass the beauties of nature could take painting into the realm of the otherworldly. In return for Ludovico s protection, this marvellous, modern painter would be celebrated as his, the human emblem of the Sforza court. The rhetoric surrounding his employment ensured that Leonardo s highly visible gifts were taken as the mirror of his patron s more abstract talents as a ruler. And, particularly in the 1490s, Leonardo s painting of a world made perfect by analysis, discipline and imagination could be understood as corresponding to the much promoted notion of the prince as the perfected ruler of an ideal state. Onlookers may have been aware of the ways in which the life stories of Ludovico and Leonardo chimed, making it clear that their achievements were due to their outstanding talents, but also the responsible ways in which they had honed these gifts. Patron and painter were exactly of an age and their roads to glory had been unconventional. Ludovico became Duke of Milan only in 1494, but (with the title Duke of Bari) had ruled the city as regent for his young nephew, Gian Galeazzo, from However, as the fourth son of Duke Francesco Sforza, he had been brought up with no real expectations of power. Leonardo was born with even fewer prospects, the illegitimate child of a peasant girl and a middle-class notary, tucked away in the Florentine countryside until his late teens, but becoming a painter whose gifts were so manifest and manifold as to guarantee his success. A publicly emblazoned partnership between patron and painter could make their contemporaries contemplate the question of immense rhetorical importance to both men of where talent comes to reside, of the diωerence between a great man and the rest. The connections that can be traced between Leonardo s artistic trajectory and Ludovico s rhetoric of rule should emphatically not, however, be seen as matters of mere cause and eωect. Unlike many of his courtier contemporaries, Leonardo was too creative and too independent to turn himself into a servile panegyrist. And Ludovico was wise enough not to attempt the complete annexation of his painter s immense creativity. Leonardo is often treated as peerless, unconnected with the world around him, locked away in the tower of his own genius. But his artistic philosophy evolved against a background of collectively 13

2 figs 44, 45 Infrared reflectography details of the London Virgin of the Rocks (cat. 32) fig. 42 Diagram of hidden composition in the London Virgin of the Rocks (cat. 32) a lost original by Leonardo. 44 Before the composition was laid out on the panel Leonardo probably made similar drawings for the heads of all the protagonists, as he did for Saint John. Both provide early examples of Leonardo s lifelong habit of working out detailed elements within larger compositions through the targeted use of highly finished drawings, studies that may even have been made after painting had begun, a practice which is most famously evident in the next decade during the execution of the Last Supper. 45 The Louvre Virgin of the Rocks (cat. 31) is a significant advance on Leonardo s previous work (coming just after the Adoration). For the first time we have a multi-figure composition that is fully completed, set within a remarkably complex landscape. Even in its compromised condition the picture demonstrates a remarkable level of execution: surviving details of hair, draperies and foliage display a sustained degree of finish, equal to any of his portraits. More important, each detail is carefully calibrated within a larger scheme of relationships of colour, tone and illumination, which are coordinated across the whole of the composition an interest of increasing importance to Leonardo, and one even more evident in the better-preserved version of the painting now in the National Gallery. The National Gallery Virgin of the Rocks (cat. 32) might seem to be a simple reprise or variation of the Louvre painting, but research undertaken in 2005 has made it clear that its production was a more convoluted process than its appearance suggests. Surprisingly, the panel was begun with a wholly unrelated composition which appears to be closely connected to compositional sketches for the Adoration of the Christ Child at Windsor and in New York (fig. 42, cats 30 and 40). The principal elements of the kneeling Virgin of that initial composition are revealed by infrared reflectography. Drawn with the brush in a liquid medium, her head and left hand are based on some sort of mechanical transfer from partial cartoons, while the drawing of her drapery and right hand is much more free and improvised, the latter in particular still sketchy and unresolved (fig. 44). 46 The relationship of this now hidden composition to other works by Leonardo is of fundamental importance for our understanding of the working practices of his studio. The designs of the Virgin s head and left hand appear in other works, a clear indication of the existence of partial cartoons, sometimes rescaled, for these features, as well of as the reuse and recycling of such elements fig. 43 giovanni antonio boltraffio and marco d oggiono The Grifi Altarpiece (detail of fig. 98), about 1497 for a variety of purposes. The pose of the hand (fig. 44) appears in the Last Supper (fig. 46), as well as in Portrait of Cecilia Gallerani (cat. 10) and the Grifi Altarpiece (fig. 43) a documented work by Boltra o and Marco d Oggiono both of which can be dated to the mid-1490s. 47 The underdrawn Virgin s head (fig. 45) is extremely similar to a reversed image of the head of a youth (cat. 76) used for Saint Philip in the Last Supper, probably planned at about the same time as the London Virgin of the Rocks. 48 The dating of these various works, from about 1489 to 1493, is also consistent with the documents of the initial contract fig. 46 The Last Supper (detail of fig. 100 showing Saint Philip s hands), /8 dispute concerning the Virgin of the Rocks, shortly post-dating December 1490, providing further confirmation of the starting date of the London work and thereby clarifying its relationship to the painting in the Louvre. Interestingly, the preliminary sketch in the Royal Collection, which is closest to the initial composition of the National Gallery picture, also contains architectural elements that are closely related to features that appear within the unfinished Saint Jerome; this reinforces the evidence provided by its walnut support for dating this picture to Leonardo s Milan years, started most probably in the very late 1480s. 49 cat. 10 (detail) 66 i n p u r s u i t o f p e r f e c t i o n 67

3 14 ( ) Study of a bear s head about 1485 Metalpoint on prepared paper 7 7 cm Private collection, New York 15 Studies of a dog s paw about 1485 Metalpoint on prepared paper cm The National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh. Purchased by the Private Treaty Sale with the aid of The Art Fund 1991 (d 5189r) Within the oeuvre of an artist as keenly interested in nature as Leonardo, his studies of animals assume a particular value. In addition to his well-known interest in horses, he made numerous drawings of other animals, both real and fantastical. These two sheets contain studies made from life and share a common provenance from the collections of Sir Thomas Lawrence ( ) and Captain Norman R. Colville ( ). 1 Both are executed in the same fine metalpoint technique on light pink or buω prepared paper and date from a period in which Leonardo was focusing intensely on the animal world. An analogous work to the Edinburgh study, dated a few years earlier, is that of the short-haired dog in the Studies of a dog and cat (British Museum, London, 1895, ). The two dogs probably belong to a diωerent breed, as seen from the ruωled and individual curled locks of fur on the legs and between the toes and claws in the Scottish drawing. Leonardo evinces a similar naturalistic accuracy in his two drawings of bears a beautiful head (private collection) and the Studies for a walking bear and his paw (Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, ), which share similar technique and preparation. Here the artist demonstrates his profound interest in the beast, probably an animal in captivity, with a superb economy of means in the fine, animated metalpoint hatching. 2 These drawings have been variously dated between the end of the 1470s and the mid-1490s. 3 Though some scholars prefer to situate these studies in Florence, they are better understood stylistically and hence chronologically alongside the revolutionary Portrait of Cecilia Gallerani (cat. 10). Leonardo s acute observation of animal anatomy and physiognomy as expressed here looks ahead to the pictorial invention of the ermine in that portrait though with its exaggerated dimensions cat. 10 (detail) and partially fantastical morphology Gallerani s ermine should be seen not as a representation of a real animal but as a symbolic presence or allegorical figure. 4 The combination of fantasy and reality revealed in the invention of the ermine does not contradict Leonardo s conception of the natural, which, as stated in the Treatise on Painting, can include constructing imaginary or unknown creatures by assembling their parts from diωerent animals. 5 Thus both sheets can be seen as important precedents rather than true preparatory studies for the fascinating creature in the Portrait of Cecilia Gallerani. The dog s paws, minutely observed from diωerent angles, anticipate those of the wriggling ermine. Similarly, the ermine s powerful head may be associated with the studies of the bear s, in the structure of the cranium and shape of its features: small round eyes, cylindrical muzzle and pointed nose. Furthermore, the present studies are characterised by their energised luminosity, with touches of metalpoint evoking the play of light and shade reminiscent of that on the dense fur of the animal cradled in Cecilia Gallerani s arms. ag l i t e r at u r e Cat. 14: Popham 1937, p. 87; Berenson 1938, vol. 2, p. 115, no. 1044c; Popham 1946, pp. 55, no. 78a, 125; Ames-Lewis and Wright in Nottingham and London 1983, p. 74, cat. 8; Kemp in London 1989, p. 96, cat. 37; Pedretti 1992, p. 188; Bambach in New York 2003, pp cat. 43; Wolk-Simon in Cremona and New York 2004, p. 89; Kemp and Barone 2010, p. 106, no. 72. Cat. 15: Popham 1937, p. 87; Berenson 1938, vol. 2, p. 115 n. 1044b; Popham 1946, pp. 55, 125 6, no. 79a/b; Kemp in London 1989, p. 98, cat. 39; Weston Lewis in Edinburgh, New York and Houston 1999, pp , cat. 1; Kemp and Barone 2010, p. 46, no. 4. cat. 14 n o t e s 1 A common French provenance has also been suggested: see Weston-Lewis in Edinburgh, New York and Houston , p The Studies of a dog s paw were made from life from a domesticated dog and not a wolf or bear, as has been argued (Weston-Lewis in Edinburgh, New York and Houston , p. 14; Barone and Kemp 2010, p. 46). They have also been associated with other studies of dissected bear paws (Windsor rl ) usually dated to the early 1490s (Clark and Pedretti , vol. 1, p. 52; Clayton in London , p. 48; Clayton 2001, pp. 50 1) but probably from the mid-1480s (I thank Martin Clayton for this observation). 3 Though frequently dated in the early 1490s, these drawings were correctly retro-dated to the previous decade (Popham 1946, p. 55; Weston Lewis in Edinburgh, New York and Houston , pp ; Bambach in New York 2003, p ; Barone and Kemp 2011, p. 46), although too rigidly linked to the end of the Florentine period. The fact that they are on the same paper as preparatory studies for the Adoration of the Magi (fig. 34) and that this pink prepared paper was not as widespread in Milan as blue prepared paper, does not appear to be su cient grounds for excluding them from the Milanese period. Milanese sheets such as cats 3, 13 and the Studies of a horse (fig. 19) are similarly coloured and prepared. 4 On the allegorical and symbolic associations of the ermine see cat bn 2038 fol. 29r; Urb. fol. 135r; r 585, mcm 554; k/w 573. cat. 15 (recto) cat. 15 (verso) 120

4 fig. 100 The Last Supper, /8 Tempera and oil on plaster, cm Santa Maria delle Grazie, Milan 252

5 91 ( ) Christ as Salvator Mundi about 1499 onwards Oil on walnut cm Private collection It has always seemed likely that Leonardo painted a picture of Christ as the Saviour of the World. 1 In 1650 the celebrated printmaker Wenceslaus Hollar signed an etching of Christ raising his right hand in blessing, holding a transparent orb in his left, with a nimbus of light behind his head; the image was taken, he states, from a painting by Leonardo (fig. 111). 2 Though Hollar was generally well-informed, this would not be enough on its own to prove that an autograph picture by Leonardo had once existed. By the seventeenth century any number of paintings by his pupils and associates were firmly attributed to Leonardo himself and there was no shortage of pupils pictures depicting the Salvator Mundi, all clearly related to one another, all unmistakably Leonardesque. In 1978 and 1982 one of these many versions was promoted as Leonardo s lost original, partly because of its similarities to the etching, a suggestion that has rightly been rejected. 3 Hollar might very well have been copying a copy. There is other evidence, however, that Leonardo explored this or a related subject. As early as the mid- 1480s he drew a head of Christ, in pen and ink, which appears in the list of his works preserved in the Codex Atlanticus (see p. 25). And in the early sixteenth century he discussed painting an adolescent Christ for Isabella d Este, Marchioness of Mantua. 4 Most importantly, there survive two red chalk drawings of draperies, obviously related to the composition etched by Hollar and the many workshop copies (cats 89, 90). But even these do not constitute proof that Leonardo painted a Salvator Mundi, and it has sometimes been argued that these drawings might have formed the basis for one or more finished designs perhaps cartoons that he made expressly to be copied by pupils but with no primary version by the master himself. Other scholars have imagined, more straightforwardly, that Leonardo s own painting disappeared long ago. The re-emergence of this picture, cleaned and restored to reveal an autograph work by Leonardo, therefore comes as an extraordinary surprise. Though Hollar s Christ is very slightly stouter and broader, the two images coincide almost exactly. The draperies are just a little simplified and there is no glow of light around Christ s head. Otherwise the newly discovered painting has the same snaking locks of hair, expressionless face and uncannily direct gaze, and the same swathe of monumental drapery across his shoulder. And the knot-pattern ornament on Christ s crossed fig. 111 wenceslaus hollar ( ) After Leonardo da Vinci, Salvator Mundi, 1650 Etching, first state, cm The Royal Collection (rl ) stole and on the border of his vestment are very similar indeed, a particularly important consideration given that this ornament is the aspect most subject to change in the diωerent surviving versions. There can be no doubt that this is the picture copied by Hollar. In fact this version of the Salvator Mundi is not a new discovery. It has been known since the beginning of the twentieth century but never seriously studied and certainly not recognised as Leonardo s own work. The picture was acquired in 1900 by Sir Francis Cook for his collection at Doughty House in Richmond, Surrey, through or from his long-standing adviser, Sir J.C. Robinson. It has not yet been discovered where Robinson obtained it. In 1913 Tancred Borenius catalogued it as a free copy after Boltra o, twice removed therefore from Leonardo. In 1958 it was sold from the Cook collection, still as a copy after Boltra o. The low esteem in which it was held is easy to explain: by the time it came into Francis Cook s possession it had been very considerably overpainted. Christ s blessing hand was the least altered area but his head had been almost entirely reinvented. And that after 1958 it was known only from the poor black-and-white photograph reproduced in Borenius s catalogue only compounded the problem. The reasons for such abundant overpaint are also clear. Though both Christ s hands are well preserved, elsewhere the picture has suωered. Sometime in the past the panel split in two, causing paint losses along the length of the crack. It has also been aggressively over-cleaned, with some abrasion of the whole picture surface and especially in the face and hair of Christ, where Leonardo s sequence of delicate paint layers l i t e r at u r e Borenius 1913, p. 123; Suida 1929, p. 140; Clark 1935, vol. 1, p. 80; Suida in Los Angeles 1949, pp. 85 6; Heydenreich 1964, p. 109; Snow-Smith 1982, pp. 11, 12, fig