Amazon.com's Best of 2001
Leonardo's The Last Supper, painted in tempera on the damp walls of a dining room for the Dominican monks of Santa Maria della Grazie in Milan, began falling apart in his lifetime. Five centuries of dust, mildew, and bad treatment (including vandalism by French 18th-century troops, Allied bombs in World War II, and various ham-handed attempts at cleaning and repainting) have only made things worse. The most recent restoration team went about the job with surgical precision, beginning in 1977. While much of the original is irrevocably lost, the fragments of paint that remain still form a deeply evocative and exquisitely rendered composition, and many of the faces have gained increased visibility and plasticity. More than 200 full-color pages painstakingly document every inch of the ghostly surface. Beginning with full views, the focus narrows until each image is presented in its actual size, interleaved with an all-black page for heightened clarity. To look so closely at the fragile network of paint flecks is to be acutely aware of the mystery of perception--that these flecks of color allow us to read each apostle's mood and personality as they reacted to Christ's words ("One of you will betray me"). The commentary, printed in pleasingly large type and fluidly translated from the Italian, is segregated from the major reproductions, allowing the fresco to speak for itself. An introductory text traces the history of the painting and its restorations, as well as shifts in critical opinion. In a lengthy, generously illustrated section at the back of the book, chief curator Pinin Brambilla Barcilon explains how she restored each portion of the masterwork. While this may be more than the casual reader cares to know, extraordinary attention to detail is one of the hallmarks of both the project and the book. --Cathy Curtis
From Publishers Weekly
Between 1494 and 1498, Leonardo da Vinci painted one of the great Western masterpieces directly onto the wall of the refectory of the Santa Maria Della Grazie church in Milan and it immediately started to deteriorate. Leonardo: The Last Supper documents the process by which, after nearly 500 years and various "restorations," conservators attempted to get the work as close as possible to its original state. For the last 20 years, fresco expert Pinin Brambilla Barcilon has presided over one of the most meticulous and controversial projects in her field. Along with da Vinci scholar and curator Pietro C. Mariani, she here presents "before," "during" and "after" detail shots of the entire work, explaining the various techniques employed and sources consulted along the way. The 382 color plates and 64 halftones in the lush, slipcased edition are accompanied by extensive, cogent commentary, translated by Harlow Tighe.
Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.
