Speaker 1: Welcome to brain Stuff, a production of iHeart Radio, Hey,
Speaker 1: brain Stuff Lauren Vogelbaum. Here located on the wall of
Speaker 1: Milan's Convent of Santa Maria de la Gracia, is a
Speaker 1: work of art that's considered by many to be one
Speaker 1: of the greatest artistic masterpieces of all time. Leonardo da
Speaker 1: Vinci is the Last Supper, but da Vinci wasn't exactly
Speaker 1: stoked about it when the Duke of Milan commissioned the
Speaker 1: piece in fourteen ninety four. We spoke with art historian
Speaker 1: Ross King, the author of several books on Italian, French
Speaker 1: and Canadian art history. He said Leonardo did not want
Speaker 1: to paint the Last Supper. Instead, he wanted to do
Speaker 1: a gigantic bronze equestrian moment, a monumental work that would
Speaker 1: certainly have made him famous. But the outbreak of war
Speaker 1: in fourteen four meant he couldn't do his bronze horse,
Speaker 1: so as compensation, he was given the task of painting
Speaker 1: a wall in a room where a band of Friars
Speaker 1: ate their dinner every day. He had never painted on
Speaker 1: such a large scale, having little experience in such a
Speaker 1: difficult task, it's not surprising that he complained bitterly about
Speaker 1: the commission, at which it was entirely possible that he
Speaker 1: would fail miserably. Happily, the story turned out otherwise. What
Speaker 1: resulted from da Vinci's hesitant participation is a mural that
Speaker 1: famously depicts the Last Supper of Jesus Christ with his
Speaker 1: apostles on the day before his crucifixion. The scene is
Speaker 1: based on the description in the Gospel of John twenty one,
Speaker 1: and da Vinci intended to convey the reactions of jesus
Speaker 1: disciples the moment that they learned that one of them
Speaker 1: would betray him. King, says da Vinci's The Last Supper
Speaker 1: is particularly important for a variety of reasons, perhaps most
Speaker 1: of all for its elevation of the artist to celebrity status.
Speaker 1: He said. It's completion marks the moment when Leonardo, then
Speaker 1: in his mid forties, finally created what he called a
Speaker 1: work of fame. It's amazing to think that before The
Speaker 1: Last Supper Leonardo had achieved very little. Petty died in say,
Speaker 1: four two, when he was forty. He would have been
Speaker 1: little more than a footnote in art history, known as
Speaker 1: someone who showed enormous promise but never delivered the goods,
Speaker 1: but with the Last Supper he delivered spectacularly. Without having
Speaker 1: created the Last Supper, he probably would never have received
Speaker 1: his later commissions, including the Mona Lisa, So the work
Speaker 1: was absolutely crucial, not only to the history of art,
Speaker 1: but also to his own career. One special feature of
Speaker 1: The Last Supper is its sheer size, approximately fifteen by
Speaker 1: twenty nine feet that's four and a half meters by
Speaker 1: about eight point eight meters. King said no one else
Speaker 1: in history had ever created such a large painting was
Speaker 1: such a great level of realistic detail, as well as
Speaker 1: with such believable emotions and dramatic expressions. No one who
Speaker 1: painted a Last Supper in the centuries afterward could do
Speaker 1: so without an eye on Leonardo's masterpiece. Da Vinci opted
Speaker 1: to portray one pivotal moment in the scene, instant just
Speaker 1: before the creation of the Eucharist or Holy Communion, when,
Speaker 1: according to the Bible Versus Corinthians eleven to twenty X,
Speaker 1: Jesus reaches for the bread and wine and tells the
Speaker 1: apostles that they represent his body and blood to be
Speaker 1: consumed in remembrance of him. Da Vinci's notebooks are a
Speaker 1: key to who the key players are in the painting,
Speaker 1: although experts still argue over some of the details. In
Speaker 1: one group, Bartholomew, James and Andrew sit together and look
Speaker 1: genuinely shocked at what Jesus has just revealed. In another group,
Speaker 1: there's Judas, Peter and John. Judas, the known betrayer, has
Speaker 1: a lot going on. He's fading into the background a bit.
Speaker 1: He's holding a bag of money, and he's knocking over
Speaker 1: a salt shaker, which experts say is meant to symbolize
Speaker 1: the expression tipping over the salt, which means betraying one's master.
Speaker 1: Jesus sits in the middle of the group, and on
Speaker 1: his other side are Apostle, Thomas, James the Greater and Philip,
Speaker 1: then Matthew, Jude and Simon. The symmetry of the figures
Speaker 1: and i pleasing use of perspective are signature da Vinci,
Speaker 1: but there are tons of details that art scholars continue
Speaker 1: to debate and dissect. Take the fish on the table,
Speaker 1: for example, is it airing or eel? In Italian, the
Speaker 1: word eel is a ringa, which might be a sort
Speaker 1: of pun on the word ringa with two rs, meaning indoctrination. However,
Speaker 1: the word herring in Northern Italian is ringa, also meaning
Speaker 1: one who denies religion. But the content and composition of
Speaker 1: the Last Supper aren't the only reasons why the painting
Speaker 1: remains legendary. King explained it has a very sad history.
Speaker 1: The paint began flaking from the wall because of a
Speaker 1: perfect storm of bad climatic conditions in the refectory, mainly
Speaker 1: cold and damp. That might not have been such a
Speaker 1: problem had Leonardo worked in the true fresco technique, which
Speaker 1: makes for very durable paintings, but he devised a method
Speaker 1: of his own that involved painting in oil and tempera
Speaker 1: on a dry wall, something artists were discouraged from doing.
Speaker 1: His technique, unsurprisingly, did not prove successful. Due to Da
Speaker 1: Vinci's ill advised choices and the poor custodianship in the
Speaker 1: centuries that followed the creation of the painting, the Last
Speaker 1: sup first started to look rough, and then things got worse.
Speaker 1: King said the work was insensitively restored by conservators who
Speaker 1: didn't know what they were doing and caused more harm
Speaker 1: than good. In sixteen fifty two, in a kind of
Speaker 1: act of vandalism, the friars from the convent knocked a
Speaker 1: hole in the wall, amputating Christ's feet to create a
Speaker 1: doorway through the painting. The refectory flooded in the nineteenth
Speaker 1: century and Napoleon used the building as a stable, which
Speaker 1: meant it was filled with horses and manure. Then, during
Speaker 1: World War Two it barely survived a bomb that destroyed
Speaker 1: much of the refectory. The fact that we still have
Speaker 1: it to enjoy is little short of miraculous. Today's episode
Speaker 1: was written by Michelle Konstantinovski and produced by Tyler Klang.
Speaker 1: For more on this and lots of other topics, visit
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