Leonardo’s “Last Supper” is a priceless piece of art with much hidden meaning and obvious talents bestowed upon a wall. Under the study of Verrocchio as a painter and a sculptor, he was able to use his skills in creating a very detailed and a very naturalistic piece of work that would be remembered for hundreds of years. He was also able to create characters with amazing individuality. Not only was his portrayal of the characters magnificent, but the symbolism he used which emphasized the story being told in the “Last Supper”. Lodovico Sforza chose Leonardo to create “The Last Supper” in the refectory of the Dominican Church of S. Maria delle Grazie in Milan.
The Abate of the S. Maria delle Grazie saw Leonardo work from morning until night on “The Last Supper” without eating. Although, there were times he would stop painting for days at a time; or, he would work on a specific character for just a few moments and then leave to continue working on it later. He worked on it from 1495 thru 1498 (Strauss, 27).
Before Leonardo began painting the actual portrait, he put down a substance which was suppose to absorb the tempora and protect the tempora from the moisture on the wall. Unfortunately, the substance was proved unsuccessful, and by 1517 it began to deteriorate. In May 1556 a painter Giovanni Batista Armenini said that the painting was ‘so badly affected that nothing is visible but a mass of blots'(Heydenreich, 18).
The Term Paper on What Is Art Back Work Painting
Intro In late Antiquity the arts consisted of the seven artes liberal es, the liberal arts: Grammar, Logic, Rhetoric, Geometry, Arithmetic, Astronomy, and Music. Philosophy was the mother of them all. On a lower level stood the technical arts like architecture, agriculture, painting, sculpture and other crafts. 'Art' as we of it today was a mere craft. Art in the Middle Ages was 'the ape of ...
The painting has continued to decay in the following centuries.
It was further damaged by restorations made by careless artists and by the addition of a doorway put in the lower part of the painting. Yet even to this day his painting “The Last Supper” is widely known and visited by many tourists each year. The remembrance of the “Last Supper” could be due to the sacredness of the parting meal. It is quite obvious that the skill used in the creation of the “Last Supper” was magnificent. Although, the way Leonardo allows its viewers to depict the scene from a specific point in the Bible adds to the importance and significance of the painting in which no other artist could even compare. He does allow the viewer to recognize this scene by the gestures of both the Lord and the Apostles.
The Lord sits ever so quietly while the Apostles rise in reaction to what the Lord had just announced. It is rather obvious that Leonardo chose the critical moment after the Lord had stated, ‘Verily I say unto you that one of you shall betray me,’ because of the emotions that evolve in this specific scene (Matt. 26.21).
He took much time to express every detail of each Apostle and the Lord. Leonardo had even wrote in one of his notebooks that “A good painter has two chief objects to paint man and the intention of his soul. The former is easy, the latter hard because he has to represent it by the attitude and movement of the limbs”(Heydenreich, 27).
For example, the Lord is very relaxed with his arms resting on the table which adds to the portrayal of His greatness. He also emphasized the Lord’s greatness by giving Him a serious attitude and by presenting Him as untouchable with the space between Himself and the Apostles.
The distance put between them is called the spacial perspective, which is one of the techniques Leonardo feels is important in naturalistic art. Although, the Apostles are painted in a more restless fashion. They are all facing different ways and seem to be jumping out of their seats. Even the grouping of the apostles in three was done intentionally. He used four gr! oups of three Apostles in each group in order to symbolize the Holy Trinity which means three, and the four groups were used to symbolize the Gospels and the Cardinal Virtues . He was very cautious in every aspect of his painting from the placement of the figures to the movement they each possessed. Leonardo had to create actions and various postures which would be appropriate for each figure in order to keep them from looking as if they were brothers.
The Essay on Peter the Apostle
Peter the apostle was born BC 15 or so. Peter the apostle has been said to look like a very weak man. He was medium height, more so tall, and had very pale skin. Also, it has been said that Peter had a short, thick, curled beard, and very thin eyebrows, if not, no eyebrows at all. Another character trait of the Peter the apostle is that his eyes were almost all black, but had red marks due to ...
Monica Strauss stated that in her research she had found that “for the first time in the history of the subject, Leonardo had distinguished each one by appearance and gesture”(Strauss, 27).
For each of the twelve Apostles he had to not only resort to the historical information on their names and on their appearances but also by the portrayal of their specific qualities as they are known to us from the Gospels. For instance, Judas was put outside the circle of the innocent Apostles and only his shadowed profile can be found. He is the only one to be found sitting in the shadows and in solitude. This allows the viewer to see the guilt he had, for he knew he was the one who would betray the Lord Jesus. He is also frozen in shock, and he is an outcast in the group.
The significance of the portrayal of Judas is very important because in earlier pictures of the Last Supper, no one had ever been able to show this (Heydenreich, 57).
Peter and John, located at the sides of Judas, were both painted with bright heads and with outstretched hands to the Lord Jesus which signify their fateful connection with Him. Yet, he distinguishes their differences by showing Peter to be more stubborn and argumentative and John to be more gentle and submissive as the Bible has thoroughly explained. Philip, on the other hand, stands up in excitement; and, he puts his hands on his chest to express a tender loyalty towards Christ. Andrew is found next to his brother Peter. Then, there is James the Greater, the older brother of John, who touches Peter’s shoulder and forms a link with Peter and John. These three are those who witnessed the Transfiguration and who accompanied Jesus to the Garden of Gethsemane (Matt.
17.1; 26.36-37).
Leonardo continued to distinguish each of the Apostles as he felt necessary. He placed James the Less, ‘the Lord’s brother’ (Gal. 1.19), to the Lord Jesus’s right where he is like Him in feature and with outstretched arms; but, his gesture is only a reaction and not an expression of a completed action like the Lord Jesus’s. Behind James the Less stands the doubting Thomas who is known to share a common feast day . St. Matthew is next and finally comes St. Jude, who is the brother of James the Less and St.
The Term Paper on Adulterous Woman Jesus John Accusers
Analysis Of The Story Of The Adulterous Analysis Of The Story Of The Adulterous Woman Stoned Obituary An Analysis of The Story of the Adulterous Woman Look which of you that never sin wrought, But is of life cleaner than she, Cast at her stones and spare her not, Clean out of sin if that ye be. (N-Town: Woman Taken In Adultery: Medieval Drama; Bevington, David; Houghton Mifflin, 1975) Who among us ...
Simon. James the Less and St. Simon were martyred together so they too have a common feast day. Leonardo not only ….
