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VINCI
laurel, vines, and foliage. The artist conveyed the
illusion of a hall of verdure. To this period likewise
belong the studies for the St. Anne. Together with
the cult of the Immaculate Conception the end of the
fifteenth century saw the rise of that of the mother of
the Blessed Virgin. The work of the learned Trithe-
mius, " De laudibus sanctissimx matris Anna^ ", dates
from 1494 (cf . Shankell, " Der Kultus der heilige Annas
am ausgange Mittelalters", Freiburg, 1893). Leo-
nardo composed two different versions of this subject,
one of them being now at the Louvre, the other at the
London Academy. That of the Louvre is unfinished.
The Vii^in is only sketched, the head of St. Anne
alone showing that modelling in which Leonardo is
unrivalled. Art possesses few groups more charming
than that of these two women, one seated on the
other's knees. Together with the "Last Supper"
Leonardo's greatest Milanese work must have been
the equestrian statue of Ludovico il Moro, the famous
"bronze horse" which he pledged himself to cast in
the letter quoted above. He worked on this con-
stantly for more than fifteen years ^1483-99). A
plaster model was cast in 1489, but the artist was dis-
satisfied with it and made another which was moulded
in 1493. He then turned his attention to prepara-
tions for casting. But the French came in 1499 and
besides driving out the duke they broke the plaster
model of his statue. We have only countless sketches,
studies, and drawings of this masterpiece and Leo-
nardo's books dealing with the anatomy and science of
the horse.
Nomadic Period. — By Ludovico's fall Leonardo was left unemployed, and he was in no haste to seek an- other position and there began for him a period of wandering. Completed works grow more and more rare, each of them showing traces of more complicated ambitions. From this period date most of his scien- tific works. At fifty he began to gather the elements of a new synthesis which was never completed. The last twenty years of his fife were given to this activity and to these experiences. From Milan, Leonardo went to Mantua where he sketched (1500) the por- trait of the Marchesa Isabella d'Este, the cartoon of which is one of the wonders of the Lou\Te. Then he went to Venice (1501) and thence to Florence; from there he entered the service of Ca?sar Borgia as mili- tary engineer and head of the corps of engineers in his Romagna campaign. After Ca-sar's fall he returned to Florence and seems to have stayed there for three or four years. Then he began see-sawing between Florence and Milan, finally taking up his residence in the latter city where he was called by a law-suit concerning the property left by his father. In 1514 we find him at Rome, but at the end of the year he returned to Florence; in 1515 came journeys to Pa via, Bologna, and a last stay of some months at Milan. Finally in 1516 he accepted the invitation of King Francis I to come to France and left Italy, never to return.
During these wanderings there are only two places where we find undoubted proofs of his activitv, at Florence (1.501-0«i) and Milan (1.506-13). At Florence he executed two of his most famous works now unfor- tunately lo.st or destroyed. The Seigniory of Florence had for the decoration of its council hall opened a contest for the portrayal of two patriotic subjects drawn from the annals of the Republic. One was an occurrence of the war against Pisa in 1304 and was confided to Michelangelo: the other commemorated the victory of .-Xnghiari Maria Visconti. This was the subject treated by Leonardo. The rival cartoons were exhibited in 1.505 and were an event in the his- tory of the school. All the youth of the artist world hastened to copy them, but in the midst of all this Michelangelo was called to Rome and abandoned his work. Warned by his experience with the "Last Supper" IxK)nardo refrained from painting in oil, but
would not be satisfied with fresco; he fancied some
process of encaustic (one of the rare instances in him
of the influence of the ancients). The attempt was
unfortunate. The coat did not dry and the colours
flowed together. But the artist was not discouraged
and continued his work. The cartoon still existed in
the eighteenth century; it is not known when it or
that of Michelangelo disappeared. The latter is
known only through a famous engraving of Marcan-
tonio Raimondi. Leonardo did not fare so well.
Apart from countless sketches there exists only a
single group from his work, that of the knights or the
"Battle of the Standard" which has been preserved by
a drawing of Rubens (Lou\tc) and an engraving of
Edelinck. Nevertheless there are few more impor-
tant battle pieces in the art work of the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries. All the chasses of Rubens and
the Flemish school are but variations and repetitions
of this furious melee. The Adoration of the Magi in
the ITflizi is unfortunately only a sketch, a rough car-
toon, chiefly interesting for the information it gives
concerning the basis of Leonardo's painting and his
manner of preparing a picture. It belongs to the
same period (about 1505) as that work of the artists
which is most popular, most complete, and most
closely associated with his name as that which best
sums up in a woman's face all the research, grace, and
seductiveness of his genius. This is the portrait of
Madonna (Monna) Lisa, wife of Ser Giocondo, and
universally known as Joconde (La Gioconda), and
which, acquired directly from the artist by Francis I,
and preserved for three centuries at Fontainebleau,
disappeared, 21 August, 1911, under mysterious cir-
cumstances, from the Louvre, where it had been
since 1793.
The numerous copies of this enchantmg face, those of the mu.seimis of Madrid, Munich, Quimper, and St. Petersburg, the Torlonia Gallery at Rome, and the Mozzi Gallery, Florence, of the Villa Sommariva on Lake Lugano, of the Hume andWoodburn collec- tions at London, can scarcely con.sole us for the loss of the masterpiece. Leonardo never painted any- thing with more love. He devoted four years to this single face. Vasari relates what delicate care he took to amuse his graceful model during the sittings and to bring to her lips that imperceptible smile, which has been taken to mean such depth and perfidy and which is merely the serene expression of a harmonious soul, of moral peace and health, with a shght tinge of Florentine irony. Its place in the Louvre is occupied by another of Leonardo's works, one of the last really authentic of his productions, the enigmatic St. John Baptist. Here the depth and complexity of his inten- tions, the search for ideal beauty, the abuse of the model, above all the systematic use of chiaroscuro, lead to odd and equivocal results. But the spoiled work formulated the whole language of chiaroscuro, and fixed its laws with a clearness which has never been surpassed.
The following pictures preserve the memory of others of Leonardo's works of which the originals are lost. The .St. John the Baptist or Bacchus full length, seated, amid a landscape; the picture belongs to a date previous to 1.505 and is contemporary with the Gio- conda. Ancient copies are at the Lou\Te and at Sant' Eustorgio, Milan. The Leda; same period; copy (by Bacchiacca?) at the Casino Borghese; others in the Ruble collection, Paris, and the Opplcr collection, Cologne; drawing by Raphael at Wind.sor. The Resurrection at the Museum of Berlin is apocryphal. The famous wax bust acquired in 1909 by the same museum is the work of an English forger who worked about 1S40. Finally the charming wax Head of the Wicar Museum, at Lille, belongs probably to the school of Canova, which robs it of none of its exquisite grace. The last picture of Leonardo's which we pos- sess is the splendid sketch of St . .Jerome in the desert
