Is There Any Works of Leonardo Da Vinci at the Metropolitan Museum of Art
The painting is unfinished, its origins shrouded in mystery—and even so information technology has been hailed as one of the bang-up masterpieces in the history of fine art. And now, an unabridged exhibition is dedicated to it at the Metropolitan Museum of Fine art.
The piece of work is Leonardo da Vinci'sSt. Jerome, and information technology is on loan from the Vatican Museums in Rome (where it is usually on view in the Pinacoteca art gallery) as office of the worldwide celebrations of the 500th anniversary of the creative person'south death.
"It's hard to function with a Leonardo at whatever moment," said Met director Max Hollein at the printing preview for the testify. "Information technology'south especially difficult to part with a Leonardo in this very yr when the whole world wants to do a Leonardo show and only very few can." (The 2 museums take been collaborating on projects, such equally last year'due south blockbuster exhibition "Heavenly Bodies: Way and the Catholic Imagination," for more than 3 decades.)
"We usually do exhibitions with many, many works, but Leonardo is different and this painting is certainly different," added Hollein, noting thatSt. Jerome is "ane of possibly merely six paintings whose authorship by Leonardo has never been questioned."
Leonardo da Vinci, St Jerome (begun circa 1482). © Governatorate of the State of the vatican city State, Vatican Museums. Photograph courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Fine art, New York.
The painting shows St. Jerome at prayer at the end of his life, a hermit in the wilderness, alone save for his lion companion—a mutual Renaissance bailiwick. And however information technology stands alone in its securely moving, intimate depiction of the penitent saint in a moment of private reverie. As Jerome stares up at his crucifix, his spiritual struggle is plain to encounter, fifty-fifty though many passages of work show trivial more than than the ground training on the woods console, with hastily sketched outlines.
"For Leonardo, a painter's near aggressive goal was to convey a composition with disarming emotion," said exhibition curator Carmen Bambach. "Few paintings in the history of Western art can elicit such a powerful psychological reaction."
Part of the painting'southward power comes from the fact that y'all tin can literally see Leonardo's hand in it.
"A close examination of the paint surface reveals the presence of Leonardo's finger prints in the upper left portions of the composition," Bambach said. "Leonardo used his finger to distribute the pigments and to create a soft focus effect in the sky and landscape."
An enlargement showing Leonardo da Vinci'south fingerprint onSt. Jerome. Photo: Sarah Cascone.
A major Leonardo scholar, Bambach recently published her authoritative, iv-volume catalogue raisonné,Leonardo da Vinci Rediscovered—an undertaking 24 years in the making. But at the Met,St. Jerome is being shown in a spare, almost empty gallery to reflect the painting'south solemnity. "The concept was to create a chapel-like sanctuary to heighten the profound contemplative dimension of the painting that Leonardo himself intended," she said.
Bambach believes that Leonardo intended St. Jerome as an assistance for personal prayer and meditation, although there are no known documents detailing the circumstances of its cosmos. The first mention of the piece of work comes in the will of Swiss artist Angelika Kauffmann (1741–1807). Some years after, it was purportedly rediscovered in Rome past Napoleon's uncle, Cardinal Joseph Fesch.
Leonardo da Vinci, St Jerome (begun circa 1482) at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. © Governatorate of the Vatican Urban center State, Vatican Museums. Photo courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.
What's undeniable is that the saint's head was cut out to create a more finished-looking painting, and that the cuts and rejoinings are still clearly visible in the panel today. According to some accounts, Fesch found 1 part of the picture at an antique shop, and the rest at a shoemaker's.
"Although it seems very mythical," Bambach said, "at that place is something in the story that has the ring of truth."
"Leonardo da Vinci'south St. Jerome" is on view at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Robert Lehman Wing, Gallery 955, 1000 Fifth Artery, New York, July 15–October vi, 2019.
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Source: https://news.artnet.com/art-world/leonardo-st-jerome-metropolitan-museum-1594957
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