deft handling of color and brush. Other early works tradi-
tionally attributed to Leonardo include the Annunciation
(c. 1474; Uffizi; see Plate VIII) and the portrait of Ginevra
de’ Benci (c. 1474 or c. 1480; National Gallery of Art,
Washington). The Benois Madonna (c. 1478; Hermitage,
St. Petersburg) reveals a figurative animation which will
characterize his later paintings.
Leonardo’s first major independent commission was
the Adoration of the Magi (Uffizi), begun in 1481, for the
monastery of San Donato a Scopeto outside Florence. The
unfinished panel contains only the underdrawing with
areas of light and shadow indicated; among the prelimi-
nary studies is a fine linear perspective study for the ar-
chitecture of the left background (also Uffizi). The
composition of the Adoration of the Magi features a pyra-
midal grouping of Mary, the Christ Child, and the three
Magi surrounded by a semicircular gathering of wor-
shipers. The predilection for geometrical compositions re-
veals Leonardo’s belief, common in the Renaissance, that
mathematics and geometry “embrace everything in the
universe.” While he was working on the Adoration panel,
Leonardo began to experiment with a more fully activated
CONTRAPPOSTOfigure, counterpositioning the shoulders
and legs to create a vigorous movement. Leonardo’s in-
vention, explored in a drawing of St. Sebastian (Kunst-
halle, Hamburg), would be known in the 16th century as
figura serpentinata (serpentine figure), and would have
great impact, especially on MICHELANGELO, who, like
Leonardo, saw figurative movement as reflecting psycho-
logical life. Another unfinished work from this period is
the painting of St. Jerome (Vatican museum, Rome).
Around 1482 Leonardo left Florence to seek employ-
ment at the court of Lodovico SFORZA“il Moro” in Milan.
A draft of his letter to Duke Lodovico survives; the areas
in which Leonardo cites expertise include the construc-
tion of bridges and irrigation canals, the designing of mil-
itary weapons, and architecture, as well as painting and
sculpture. He offers to construct the colossal bronze
equestrian monument which Lodovico desired to have
made in memory of his father Francesco. Leonardo en-
tered the service of Lodovico, directing festivals, display-
ing his talent as a musician, working on architectural
projects, and studying anatomy and painting; one portrait,
known as the Lady with an Ermine, is of Cecilia Gallerani,
Lodovico’s young mistress (c. 1483; Czartoryski museum,
Cracow). Two paintings from this time pose particular
problems regarding their mutual relationship, an early
Madonna of the Rocks (c. 1484; Louvre, Paris) and a later
copy of the same painting (c. 1488, perhaps reworked
c. 1506; National Gallery, London); the extent of
Leonardo’s hand in the London painting is uncertain. The
Louvre painting skillfully demonstrates Leonardo’s use of
SFUMATO, a subtle modeling revealed through a thin veil of
atmosphere, delicately blending the lines and colors.
From 1495 to 1497 Leonardo worked on the LAST SUPPER
in the refectory of Sta. Maria della Grazie, Milan, a com-
position that exemplifies the ideals of High Renaissance
art, with its convincing illusionism, heroic scale, and psy-
chological reactions displayed by the apostles to Christ’s
prophecy of his immiment betrayal. It embodies
Leonardo’s maxim: “Painted figures ought to be done in
such a way that those who see them will be able to easily
recognize from their attitudes the thoughts of their
minds.”
Leonardo left Milan in 1499 just after French troops
entered the city to put an end to the rule of Lodovico
Sforza. He traveled to Mantua and Venice, but by April
1500 was back in Florence, where, in 1503, he had his
name reinscribed in the roll of guild painters. The brilliant
maturity of Leonardo’s art was, according to Vasari,
viewed by excited crowds of Florentines who were aston-
ished at his cartoon of the Virgin and Christ Child with St.
Anne (now lost). The cartoon was probably similar to the
Burlington House cartoon of the Virgin and Child with St.
Anne (1500–05; National Gallery, London) and the panel
of the Virgin and Child with St. Anne (c. 1508; Louvre);
both works displayed a masterful command of modeling,
creating in illusory forms the palpability of sculpture.
During this Florentine period Leonardo painted MONA
LISA, whom Vasari identified as the wife of Francesco del
Giocondo. Vasari praised the portrait for its naturalism;
only in the 19th century did critics begin to read personal
psychological revelations in the picture (see Plate X).
From 1503 to 1505 Leonardo worked on the Battle of
Anghiari (now lost, although studies for it survive) for the
Sala del Gran Consiglio of the Palazzo Vecchio; Michelan-
gelo, in 1504, was contracted to paint an adjoining fresco
in the same council hall. Between 1506 and 1513
Leonardo worked in both Florence and Milan; he jour-
neyed to Rome in 1513. A late work, St. John the Baptist (c.
1515; Louvre) is perhaps his most enigmatic; the intense
chiaroscuro is prophetic of later baroque painting.
For Leonardo, art as he wrote, “truly is a science.”
Nowhere is his belief observed more completely than in
the over 3500 surviving pages of his notebooks, which
contain detailed observations on the widest variety of nat-
ural phenomena, including mathematics, perspective,
modeling, color, optics, anatomy, painting media, sculp-
ture, philosophy, architecture and urban planning, astron-
omy, engineering, and the earth sciences. Visual form was
given to his observations and ideas in numerous drawings
which, more than any other medium, express the freedom
of his mind, the subtlety of his observing eye, and the tal-
ent of his hand. In 1516 Leonardo traveled to France at
the invitation of FRANCIS I. Among the projects he pro-
posed to the French king was a scheme for regulating the
waters of the Loire. He died at Clos-Luce, near Amboise,
in the manor given to him by Francis.
Further reading: Serge Bramly, Leonardo: The Artist
and the Man (London: Michael Joseph, 1992); KennethLLeeoonnaarrddoo ddaa VViinnccii 2 27755