by Martin Kemp
Demonstration of the Vessels of the Thorax, and the Heart as the “Seed” of the Vascular System, c. 1508–10, Windsor, Royal Library, 19028r.
Demonstrations of the Trachea and the Branching of the Bronchi in the Lungs and the Organs of the Upper Abdomen, c. 1508–10, Windsor, Royal Library, 19054v.
Demonstration of the Irrigation Systems of a Female Body, c. 1508–10, Windsor, Royal Library, 12281r.
Studies of a Wig for Leda, c. 1506–15, Windsor, Royal Library, 12516.
Studies of the Star-of-Bethlehem (Ornithogalum umbellatum), Crowfoot (Ranunculus aquatilis), Wood Anemone (Anemone nemorosa), and Sun Spurge (Euphorbia helioscopia), c. 1506–8, Windsor, Royal Library, 12424.
Studies of Turbulent Flow Past Tilted Obstacles and Water Falling into a Pool, c. 1508–9, Windsor, Royal Library, 12660v.
Studies of Water and Obstacles, with a List of Books for Leonardo’s Treatise on Water, c. 1508, Collection of Bill Gates, Codex Leicester, 15v.
Salvator Mundi, c. 1504–10, Abu Dhabi, Louvre.
Study for the Drapery on the Chest of the Salvator Mundi and for a Sleeve, c. 1504, Windsor, Royal Library, 12525.
Study for the Sleeve of the Salvator Mundi, c. 1504, Windsor, Royal Library, 12524.
Virgin of the Rocks, c. 1495–1508, London, National Gallery.
Study for a Seated St. John the Baptist, c. 1508–13, formerly Museo di Sacro Monte, Varese (lost).
Cartoon for the Virgin, Child, St. Anne, and St. John the Baptist, c. 1507–8, London, National Gallery.
Drawing for the Cartoon of the Virgin, Child, St. Anne, and St. John the Baptist, c. 1507, London, British Museum.
Virgin, Child, St. Anne, and a Lamb, c. 1508–16, Paris, Louvre.
Study for Head of St. Anne, c. 1508–10, Windsor, Royal Library, 12533.
Study for the Drapery of the Virgin, c. 1508–10, Paris, Louvre.
Study of Two Distant Mountain Ranges, c. 1511, Windsor, Royal Library, 12410.
Studies of the Light of the Sun on the Moon and Earth, c. 1508, Collection of Bill Gates, Codex Leicester, 2r.
Ventricles of the Brain Injected with Wax, c. 1507–10, Windsor, Royal Library, 19127r.
Bones and Muscles of the Shoulder and Neck, with a Wire Diagram, c. 1510, Windsor, Royal Library, 19003r.
Studies of an Ox Heart, Its Major Vessels, and Its Aortic Valves, c. 1513, Windsor, Royal Library, 19073–19074v.
Studies of a Tricuspid Valve, Vortices of Blood, and a Glass Model, c. 1513, Windsor, Royal Library, 19117v.
Sequences of Aliquot Numbers and Geometrical Studies of Areas, c. 1507–13, Milan, Biblioteca Ambrosiana, Codice atlantico, 307v.
Studies of a Fetus in the Womb and of the Placenta, c. 1515, Windsor, Royal Library, 19074v.
A Chain Ferry on the Adda at Vaprio near the Villa Melzi, c. 1511–13, Windsor, Royal Library, 12400.
An Old Man, with Water Rushing Turbulently Past Rectangular Obstacles at Different Angles, c. 1510, Windsor, Royal Library, 12579r.
Studies for a Spiral Staircase and a Pump, London, British Museum, c. 1516, Codex Arundel, 264r.
A Deluge Wrecking a Mountain, Woods, and a Township, c. 1515–17, Windsor, Royal Library, 12380.
St. John the Baptist, c. 1507–14, Paris, Louvre.
1. Baptism of Christ, Andrea del Verrocchio and Assistants
c. 1474–76, Florence, Uffizi
Andrea del Verrocchio (c. 1435–88), in whose Florentine workshop Leonardo was trained, was a major sculptor in a wide range of media. He also undertook paintings, in which studio assistants participated extensively. We know that Leonardo was still working with Verrocchio in 1476, when he was twenty-four. Early sources record that Leonardo painted an angel in Verrocchio’s Baptism (opposite), once housed in the church of San Salvi in Florence, which was largely destroyed in 1529.
The two main figures in the painting, Christ and St. John the Baptist, are constructed in Verrocchio’s muscular and sinewy manner. The angel on the far left is clearly by Leonardo. The figure’s nervous intensity, the vibrant highlights of his hair, the radiant glass beads on the upper border of his tunic, and the incisive rendering of light and shade on the angular folds of his garment are early hallmarks of Leonardo’s style. The angel’s pious companion is prettily portrayed, but in a more conventional Florentine mode.
We can go further, assisted by technical analyses, and see that Leonardo has actually intervened more widely in the picture. The painting was first undertaken in the egg-based medium of tempera, but the later interventions are in the relatively new medium of oil. The figure of Christ and perhaps the legs of St. John have been finished in oil, rendering the anatomy more subtly than the linear description of St. John’s hand and arm, which have something of the quality of unyielding sculpture. The optical potential of the new medium is also exploited in the cascading, rippling, and bubbling waters of the River Jordan, in the blurred atmosphere of the lake, and in the rocky prominences in the landscape above the angels’ heads. These also speak of Leonardo. Others aspects of the picture, such as the schematized palm tree, indicate that at least one other assistant was involved.
In his Lives of the Artists, Giorgio Vasari (1511–74) tells how Verrocchio felt humiliated by the accomplishment of his young assistant, vowing never to touch a brush again. This may just be a story, but it accurately reflects the gulf between Verrocchio and the youthful Leonardo as painters of nature.
“The figure’s nervous intensity, the vibrant highlights of his hair, radiant glass beads on the upper border of his tunic and the incisive rendering light and shade on the angular folds of his garment are early hallmarks of Leonardo’s style.”
2. “Val d’Arno Landscape”
1473, Florence, Uffizi
Leonardo’s inscription on the top left tells us that this drawing was made on “the day of S. Maria delle Neve [Holy Mary of the Snows] on the 5 August 1473.” Leonardo was twenty-one. This is the first dated landscape drawing in the history of art. The reference is to the miraculous snowfall in fourth-century Rome that, according to legend, had outlined the ground plan of the major basilica Santa Maria Maggiore.
We are presented with the plunging panorama of a fertile plane and distant mountains, framed dramatically by precipitous hills. On the right a waterfall bursts from a high source, crashing initially onto a flat ledge. On the left a belligerent castle thrusts into space from the prow of an abrupt hill. The setting up of an extensive landscape as viewed from a lofty position was not novel in itself, but the energy of Leonardo’s topographical drama was unprecedented.
The impulsive penwork is full of febrile motion. We seem to be urgent witnesses to what the artist saw on that particular fifth of August. This is what has generally been assumed. But can we be sure that this is the case?
The construction of the landscape is full of illogicalities. What are the spatial relationships between the cliff on the right, where we are standing, and the castle on the left? Would a waterfall really emerge like that from so close to the top of a mighty hill? The foreground trees are on the same scale as those quite far away.
It may be that the landscape is a wonderful product of Leonardo’s imagination, based generically on the topography of Tuscany. We know that the Gherardini (the family of Mona Lisa) had been patrons of an oratory dedicated to Holy Mary of the Snows on a hill above Greve in Chianti. The Gherardini family also once owned a grand castle in the region (demolished when they fell foul of the Florentine government). Is this a fantasy about the history of the Gherardini?
Whether fantastical or real, Leonardo’s landscape is something new.
3. The Annunciation
c. 1473–74, Florence, Uffizi
This painting comes from the sacristy in the convent of San Bartolomeo at Monte Oliveto, high above the south bank of the Arno. It is not the right shape for an altarpiece and was probably built into an item of furniture, such as a large chest, in the sacristy.
The Virgin sits outside her rather grand house
, reading—as had become customary in depictions of Mary in the Annunciation—in this case from a sacred book protected by a diaphanous cloth. The decorative motifs of the improbable pedestal of her lectern are closely related to Verrocchio’s tomb for Piero and Giovanni de’ Medici in the Basilica di San Lorenzo, Florence. The scene’s “enclosed garden” (hortus conclusus) refers to that in the Song of Songs in the Bible, where it symbolizes Mary’s virginity—as does the white lily, visible to the right of the angel’s face.
The painting is saturated by youthful ambition. The assertive sculptural qualities of the outer garments of the two participants show that they were studied from draperies placed over model figures and set with clay, as in the drawing in the Louvre (see page 8). The remarkably dense carpet of flowers seethes with superabundant life. The angel’s wings testify to Leonardo’s close studies of birds, although the paint in the nearer wing has deteriorated in the row of feathers that taper to its tip. The distant seascape flanked by vertiginous mountains fades with consummate delicacy into the mists.
The perspective of the tiled pavement, lectern, and house has been drawn out with pedantic care, using lines incised into the priming of the panel. We know that Leonardo originally planned a nonforeshortened wall with a window behind Mary. For all his efforts, the space does not really cohere, and the position of Mary’s right arm in relation to the book defies the logics of space and anatomy. In all respects, this appears to be Leonardo’s earliest known painting.
Technical examination has revealed a number of changes in the poses of the figures. Such instinctive adjustments made during the course of painting and after the design stage are characteristic of Leonardo throughout his career, diverging from the standard Florentine practice.
“The scene’s ‘enclosed garden’ (hortus conclusus) refers to that in the Song of Songs in the Bible, where it symbolizes Mary’s virginity—as does the white lily, visible to the right of the angel’s face.”
4. Drapery of a Kneeling Figure
c. 1473–74, Paris, Musée du Louvre
This is probably a study for the angel in an Annunciation, or perhaps for a Baptism, but it does not correspond to either of the known paintings. There is a series of drawings from the circle of Verrocchio executed in this technique—drawn very delicately with a fine brush on prepared linen with white heightening. Some can be attributed with some confidence to Domenico Ghirlandaio (1449–94), a fellow pupil of Leonardo, but it is generally difficult to match the studies precisely with actual paintings, and the very careful technique makes it difficult to differentiate the “hands” of the various artists responsible.
Vasari wrote in 1568 in Lives that he personally owned examples by Leonardo: “[Leonardo] often made models and figures in clay on which he placed rags infused with clay. Then he set out patiently to portray them on certain fine canvases of Rheims linen or on treated cloth, on which he worked with black and white using the point of a brush. These were miraculous works, as those that I have in our book of drawings still testify.” Vasari’s book contained prime examples of drawings by various masters, a good number of which now survive as separate sheets. Looking at the angular intricacies of the drapery in this particular drawing, we can well believe Vasari’s account of Leonardo’s methods. The angularity of the folds supports the idea that the cloth was dipped into liquid clay and allowed to dry on a model.
The best criterion for recognizing which drawings are by Leonardo is his treatment of light as a radiance transmitted through the air rather than as a layer of lighter and darker modeling adhering to the surfaces of forms. Leonardo’s light rebounds from illuminated surfaces to strike areas that are in shadow. The illustrated drawing combines great conviction of sculptural structure with an active light that plays in a scintillating manner across and within the folds. In this it shares more with Leonardo’s angel in the Baptism of Christ than with The Annunciation.
5. Study of a Lily (Lilium candidum) with the Ground Plan of a Building
c. 1473–74, Florence, Uffizi
The white blossoms of the lily symbolize the purity of the Virgin and allude to the gospel of St. Matthew (6:25): “Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they toil not, neither do they spin: And yet I say unto you, That even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these.” The lily was a common attribute in an Annunciation and sometimes appeared in images of the Madonna and Child.
This carefully prepared drawing in pen and ink over black chalk with brown wash and white heightening has something of the wiry quality of the bronze plants that Verrocchio used as decorative motifs in his sculptures. Leonardo had also been looking at the portrayal of nature in Netherlandish oil painting, most notably the flowers in an altarpiece by Hugo van der Goes (c. 1440–82) that was in Florence. Leonardo’s emphatic Lily was surely studied from life.
The drawing’s function as a cartoon is clear, because some of the outlines have been pricked through to facilitate the transfer of the design to the surface of a painting. This would be accomplished by dusting powdered charcoal through the perforations. The pricking does not extend to the upper stem and buds. The outlines do not provide a precise match with the lily held by the angel in The Annunciation (see pages 6–7), but the pricked sections are quite close. It is possible that the drawing was indeed used by Leonardo in his painting, and that he made characteristic adjustments during the actual positioning of the flower between the angel’s face and upraised hand.
Before the lily appeared on the sheet, Leonardo had been drawing a ground plan in pen with a ruler. To judge from the fan of converging lines toward the bottom of the sheet (which has been substantially trimmed all round), he was working out the perspective projection of the plan. This is much in keeping with his rather pedantic efforts to provide the Virgin in the painting with a perspectively rendered house.
6. Bust of a Helmeted Warrior in Profile
c. 1476, London, British Museum
Nothing better illustrates the close relationship between Verrocchio as a sculptor and Leonardo as a draftsman than this highly finished drawing. It is a graphic variation on Verrocchio’s pair of bronze reliefs depicting the Persian king Darius and Alexander the Great, both made for Lorenzo de’ Medici (1449–92) as a gift for the Renaissance monarch of Hungary, Matthias Corvinus. The bronzes are lost but we know of versions in other media. Alexander was characterized as a youthful hero, while Darius was seen as older and more gnarled, as in Leonardo’s drawing.
The armor and the extravagant helmet are fantastically compounded from motifs drawn freely from ancient Roman decorative arts and are endowed with an almost living vitality. The floral motifs and dragon’s wing are portrayed as if they are studied from natural forms. The exuberance is reminiscent of bronze decorations on Verrocchio’s tomb of Piero and Giovanni de’ Medici in San Lorenzo (see page 6), while the gruff warrior recalls one of the aggressive soldiers in Verrocchio’s silver relief of the Beheading of St. John the Baptist (1477–80).
The profile head of the roaring lion on the breastplate of the armor, apparently taken over from Verrocchio’s Darius, not only underscores the king’s intransigent valor but also makes specific reference to the ancient science of physiognomy, in which human faces were aligned with those of specific animals for their supposedly shared characters. According to the doctrine of the four temperaments, a brave man of choleric disposition shares the attributes of warlike Mars and the magnanimous fierceness of the lion. (See also pages 71 and 113.)
Executed meticulously in silverpoint on cream prepared paper, with some white heightening, the drawing does not have an obvious function. It does not appear to be a preparatory study. It seems to be a virtuoso, independent demonstration by the young Leonardo, boasting of his mastery in a way that both pays homage to his master and aspires to surpass him.
“The armor and the extravagant helmet are fantastically compounded from motifs drawn freely from ancient Roman decorative arts and are endowed with an almost living vitality.”
7. Madonna and Child with a Vase of Flowers (or with a Carnation)
c. 1475, Munich, Alte Pinakothek
Small-scale pictures of the Virgin Mary and the infant Jesus were a stock-in-trade for Renaissance workshops, often involving young painters who realized the master’s designs in saleable form. A number of such Madonnas originated from the Verrocchio studio.
Although the Munich Madonna and Child is probably not based directly on a known Verrocchio design, it shows every sign of being a Verrocchio & Co. picture. The Madonna’s facial type is very close to that in a drawing by Verrocchio in the British Museum. Master and pupil also share a delight in complex intertwined plaits of hair offset by falling cascades of curls.
As in the Baptism (see page 2), the young Leonardo is striving throughout to achieve something beyond the norm. The composition is ambitious. The Virgin stands behind a ledge, with her colorful drapery piled up in dynamic array, while the pudgy and active child leaves a marked impress on his cushion. The intensity of the child’s somewhat clumsy focus on the carnation held by his mother, reinforced by her acquiescent glance, is nicely observed. The carnation was a symbol of love, and there was a legend that it sprang from the tears shed by Mary on the road to Calvary. Its red color may also allude to the blood of Christ.
Where Leonardo departs most radically from the standard Madonnas is in his efforts to exploit the newish medium of oil to create novel optical effects. The glassy sheen of the vase with its vivacious flowers, and the light on the oval jewel clasping her dress—reflected at the top and refracted below—show that he has been enjoying the naturalistic wonders of Netherlandish paintings. Leonardo used the oil medium to paint the landscape in a suggestive way that is more “impressionistic” than the styles seen in Northern prototypes. He also attempted to soften the flesh tones by applying multiple layers of pigment saturated in oil, which caused wrinkles in the Virgin’s skin as various layers dried at different rates. Leonardo’s levels of early ambition result in an uneven picture that is full of potential.