Cathy's Art Diary

Fascinating exhibition at the Royal Academy focusing on the years in the early 16th century when these three great Renaissance artists were working in Florence. I have done various courses and lectures which have covered this period and I was grateful that I had as I would have liked a bit more scene setting in the narrative and display. A roundup of what the two established artists, Michelangelo and Leonardo, had done before this point would have been useful as well as some more sense of what the city was like and where it was politically. That said, to an art history geek like me, the show was a joy, focusing on a short period of time and covering some iconic projects. I liked the contrast between the mature artists and the young Raphael who was learning from looking at their works. The first room looked at Virgin and Child works and how they were influenced by the “Taddei Tondo” owned by the RA. I liked the depth of this examination. It led into the second room which looked i...

Fascinating online lecture from the National Gallery outlining the latest scientific research on Leonardo’s “Virgin of the Rocks”. The format of the event was an interview with Marta Melchiorre of the gallery’s scientific department by Carlo Corsato from the learning department, leading her though some of the newest scientific techniques to analyses painting in a non-invasive way and what they have shown us about this painting. I’m not sure I understood all the science but I was intrigued by the results. Most fascinating were new ways of mapping the chemicals in pigments across a painting and, in this case, a zinc map showed up the underdrawing more clearly as the drawing material contained the chemical. This showed more of a very different composition under the one we see now which had been partly discovered in 2004. Melchoirre discussed how this drawing of the virgin looking down at the child supported by an angel closely follows a drawing in the Metropolitan Museum which also...

Excellent three-part online course from Paula Nuttall looking at the main three Leonardo de Vinci portraits of women. Paula spent a session on each of the ladies, Ginevra de’Benci (shown here), Cecilia Gallerani, usually called The Lady with the Ermine and the Mona Lisa. In each case she placed the portrait within Leonardo’s career and explained how it showed artistic techniques he was exploring at the time. She also told us about the ladies themselves and discussed why the pictures were commissioned and by who. In each case she also talked about the condition of the works and recent scientific studies of them. We looked at what the Ginerva de’Benci might have looked like before it was cut down, how 19th century conservation work has damaged Cecilia Gallerani particulary adding the dark background and weird chin strap and finally what the Mona Lisa might look like without the layers of dark varnish and why is in unlikely anyone would dare to clean it.  

Innovative online lecture from the National Gallery looking at how artists have embraced science and how they have depicted it. Nick Pace took us on an interesting journey through the scientific endeavours of Leonardo Da Vinci and Durer from their studies and prints of drawing devises through their anatomical and botanical works and Leonardo’s geological studies. He then turned to the Enlightenment and in particular Joseph Wright of Derby to look at how artists of that time depicted new scientific developments. It is always good to revisit Wright of Derby’s work and it was nice to discover a new work by Jacques Louis David of Antoine Laurent Lavoisier and Marie Anne Lavoisier from The Met showing the couple with their scientific equipment.

Disappointing exhibition at the National Gallery illuminating their “Virgin of the Rocks” painting. I’d hoped this would offer something new however it felt very thin and seemed to make a few points in a large space. The space was divided into five galleries each one focusing on an aspect of the picture however all the points, except maybe the last, could have been made with one information board. I’m afraid it was a classic case of style over substance. The first room, shown here, looked at the role of landscape in the picture using large photographs of the Alps, broken up by a metal screen of boxes with quotes from Leonardo on them, some in his mirror writing which was then reflected by the side of the box if you got the angle right. The second room looked at his use of light and shade and did have quite clever light boxes with white objects in them where you could alter the light source and see what difference it made to how it looked. Interesting but once you’d don...

Stunning exhibition at the Queen’s Gallery of drawings by Leonardo Da Vinci from the Royal Collection. Leonardo made an kept thousands of drawings which were inherited by his favourite pupil, Francesco Melzi. They were then acquired by the sculptor, Pompeo Leoni, who mounted them in two albums. By 1660s one of these was owned by the Duke of Arundel and was given to Charles II. The drawings were arranged chronologically but with themed sections where they fit that chronology. They traced him moving between Florence and Milan and then on to France and covered artistic sketches as well as scientific ideas, anatomy and botanical studies and designs. My favourite sections brought together studies for well know paintings which had large reproductions of the pictures for comparison. This includes a lovely head of the St Bartholomew in the Last Super and the beautiful study of hands for the Lady with the Ermine. I think my favourite was the study for the head of Leda which sho...

Disappointing exhibition at the British Library looking at the role of motion in in his quest to understand the natural world. The show was based around three of the codex’s The British Library’s own, Codex Arundel, one from the Victoria and Albert Museum, Codex Forster II and Codex Leicester from the Bill Gates Collection. The leaves from these were shown well in upright display units and double sided ones showed both sides and wove both into the narrative. I just say disappointing as I hadn’t realised the show had such a narrow subject matter and the descriptions become quite scientifically dense. It is always wonderful to see Leonardo’s neat backwards writing but I found it frustrating that you were so reliant on the descriptions as you couldn’t read the originals. I did love the exquisite small sketches in the margins which still had a real immediacy. The show finished with a wonderful AV of the British Library’s own Codex where you could see a scan of the original, ...

Interesting discussion at Charleston Farmhouse as part of the Charleston Festival looking at Leonardo da Vinci on the 500th anniversary of his death. It began with the bother Michael and Stephen Farthing talking about their book   on Leonardo’s anatomical drawings. Michael is a surgeon and Stephen an artist so they had brought their different expertise to the work. They talked about Leonardo’s ideas to publish an anatomical text book and how the pictures were largely forgotten in the Royal Collection until William Hunter, the first professor of anatomy at the Royal Academy brought attention to it. They talked about how accurate the drawings were and how close Leonardo came to changing anatomical knowledge. Ben Lewes then talked about his book on the Salvator Mundi and looked at the controversy around its authenticity. It was initially bought at an auction in New Orleans for about $1000 but later sold for $450m. The author had researched who the original seller was and ...

Small exhibition at the National Gallery bringing together their work by these three High Renaissance artists. The show didn’t do much more than display works I already know well together with a bit of an introduction. They even had their original labels and no new commentary on them to make links. The show would have been better described as “we’ve still got the Royal Academy Tondo so what more can we do with it”! Still how can I complained about seeing such iconic works together! Closes on 28 January 2017  

Fascinating exhibition at the Science Museum looking at the inventions of Leonardo Da Vinci. The exhibition was based on models made for an exhibition in 1952 in Milan which were shown against reproductions of paintings and sketches. There were really good interactive displays to help you understand the science of the   machines which would be great to catch children’s imaginations. I liked the labels on the objects which classed them as innovative, a development of a previous idea or an idea which wouldn’t have worked in practice. I loved the section on the war machines and designs for fortifications particularly as many of these were designed for Cesare Borgia and I’d just finished a book about him. Also the section on the work he did to improve manufacturing for the Sforza’s in Milan. Most visually dramatic was the section on how he imagined ways in which man might fly. It described how his ideas developed as he realised that human muscle power would be insuffi...

Travelling exhibition at the Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery to mark the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee. Birmingham is the first venue for this lovely exhibition of 10 drawings by Leonardo Da Vinci from the Royal Collection. They are a perfect selection of drawings to give an overview of his work covering anatomical works, designs, maps and much more. It included iconic images such as the head of Leda and a design for the great equestrian statue in Milan. I went on a quiet Wednesday morning but there was still a small queue to get in and signs round the gallery to show that at peak times, I guess weekends, the queues can be more than 2 hours long. It is great to see art being so popular.

Fascinating lecture by the curator of the Leonardo exhibition, Luke Syson, at the National Gallery looking at what he had learnt from living with the pictures in the exhibition over the last few months. In particular he talked about what he had learnt about the studio set up and processes. He discussed how new information which had appeared from a copy of the Mona Lisa in Madrid had supported up his idea that often the pictures where not so much copies as a work by a studio assistant painted alongside Leonardo as he produced the original. This is based on the idea that each picture shows the same changes in the under drawings. He talked about a later pictures which were produced by two of Leonardo’s students which showed that it was not unusual for two artists to work on the same picture. This was a lovely way to round of an exciting exhibition and very interesting to see that the curator had continued to learn about the works during the show by looking at them and sharing ideas.

Charming lecture at the National Gallery to complement the Leonardo exhibition looking at a pageant designed by him called Festa del Pardadiso in honour of a Sforza wedding. Sian Walters used a translation of a description of the event to talk about what it consisted of relating it to contemporary pictures. The first four hours of the pageant consisted of dancing so to investigate that Darren Royston from Nonsuch Dance used the dance group to illustrate the role of dancing at the time and what the dances might have looked like.

Stunning exhibition at the National Gallery focusing on the period in Leonardo da Vinci’s life when he worked at the Court of Milan. This is obviously the blockbuster exhibition of 2011-12 but it was well worth the trouble to get tickets and my visit to it at 8.30 in the evening. I had expected it might just be about the well known pictures but it was actually a very scholarly display. It was magical to see the two “Virgin of the Rocks” together. The person I visited with was disappointed that the pictures weren’t side by side however we soon realised if they had been it would have just shown up how dirty the Louvre on was! The “Lady with an Ermine” was entrancing. I loved the ‘new’ picture “Salvatora Mundi”. However best of all was the juxtaposition of drawings and paintings to give some idea of their development. The best example of this was the studies for the “Last Supper” displayed either side of the contemporary copy of it. It gave a sense that Leonardo had collected faces and ty...

Super lecture at the National Gallery to accompany the current Leonardo exhibition given by Eric Harding. It looked at his work in the late 1980s to repair and conserve the Leonardo cartoon after it was shot. He had recently retired from the British Museum but was seen as the only person who could do the work and came out of retirement to do it. He was the most engaging speaker and answered questions generously and in a very open manner. It was fascinating to hear what new techniques were used on this work and the meticulous nature of saving all the minute pieces and cataloguing them to rebuild the work.

A good discussion at the National Gallery to accompany the current Leonardo exhibition chaired by the curator of the show Luke Syson with Martin Caplin from the Royal Library at Windsor and the artist Michael Craig-Martin. The two speakers each spoke for about 20 minutes on the role of drawing in Leonardo’s work and then had a discussion with the chair and the audience. They addressed pictures which were studies, how Leonoard returned to studies throughout his career and the role of finished drawings. Most fascinating was to hear the artist Michael Craig-Martin talk from an artists view point and how he saw some of the unfinished drawings as an invitation to continue to image.

A wonderful lecture at the National Gallery to accompany the current Leonardo exhibition given my Martin Kemp, Emeritus Professor at Oxford. He looked in particular at the newly attributed painting “Salvator Mundi” describing how he first saw it in the conservation studio of the National Gallery and the work that has been done to attribute it to Leonardo. It was quite magical to hear first hand about this work and to be taken through the detail of why he feels it is genuine. I can’t wait to see it in the exhibition.