Ross King. (2012). Leonardo and the Last Supper. Bloomsbury Publishing.

Ross King. 2012. Leonardo and the Last Supper. Bloomsbury Publishing.

Ross King, Leonardo and the Last Supper. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2012.

Ross King. Leonardo and the Last Supper. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2012.

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1. • role: Author
   • fileAs: King,Ross
   • bioText: Born and raised in Canada, Ross King has lived in England since 1992. In 2002-03, two books of his were published in the United States, Domino, about the world of masquerades and opera in 18th century London and the New York Times bestselling Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling.
   • name: Ross King

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title

Leonardo and the Last Supper

fullDescription

Early in 1495, Leonardo da Vinci began work in Milan on what would become one of history's most influential and beloved works of art—The Last Supper. After a dozen years at the court of Lodovico Sforza, the Duke of Milan, Leonardo was at a low point personally and professionally: at 43, in an era when he had almost reached the average life expectancy, he had failed, despite a number of prestigious commissions, to complete anything that truly fulfilled his astonishing promise. His latest failure was a giant bronze horse to honor Sforza's father: his 75 tons of bronze had been expropriated to be turned into cannon to help repel a French invasion of Italy. The commission to paint The Last Supper in the refectory of a Dominican convent was a small compensation, and his odds of completing it were not promising: Not only had he never worked on a painting of such a large size—15' high x 30' wide—but he had no experience in the extremely difficult medium of fresco.
In his compelling new book, Ross King explores how—amidst war and the political and religious turmoil around him, and beset by his own insecurities and frustrations—Leonardo created the masterpiece that would forever define him. King unveils dozens of stories that are embedded in the painting. Examining who served as the models for the Apostles, he makes a unique claim: that Leonardo modeled two of them on himself. Reviewing Leonardo's religious beliefs, King paints a much more complex picture than the received wisdom that he was a heretic. The food that Leonardo, a famous vegetarian, placed on the table reveals as much as do the numerous hand gestures of those at Christ's banquet.
As King explains, many of the myths that have grown up around The Last Supper are wrong, but its true story is ever more interesting. Bringing to life a fascinating period in European history, Ross King presents an original portrait of one of history's greatest geniuses through the lens of his most famous work.

reviews

1. • premium: False
   • source: Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times
   • content: King gives us a gripping account of how that painting was created...[and] deftly situates the painting in a historical context... [a] fascinating volume.
2. • premium: False
   • source: The New Yorker
   • content: [A] lively history.
3. • premium: False
   • source: New York Times Book Review on THE JUDGMENT OF PARIS
   • content: The Judgment of Paris tells a well-known story, but one seldom recounted in such vivid detail, or with such a novelistic sense of plot and character...In all, King pulls off a tour de force of complex narrative that readers of his previous books about the Sistine Chapel or Brunelleschi's dome will have come to expect.
4. • premium: False
   • source: The Cleveland Plain Dealer
   • content: Leonardo and the Last Supper is meticulously researched, gracefully written and fascinating to read.
5. • premium: False
   • source: Philadelphia Inquirer
   • content: Ross King, an English novelist and historian, tells the story, in Leonardo and the Last Supper, of the improbable creation of one of art's greatest masterpieces. With a fiction writer's feel for character, King depicts a supremely ingenious, enigmatic, stubbornly independent, and underachieving Leonardo, and, with a nonfiction writer's skill, he sets the sketch against a richly described background of a society in creative and often violent ferment.
6. • premium: False
   • source: Los Angeles Times on THE JUDGMENT OF PARIS
   • content: Riveting...Such material could have been tedious in less nimble literary hands. But so thorough is King's grasp of the Second Empire's cultural politics, so ironic his wit and choice of detail, that his text remains a page-turner throughout.
7. • premium: False
   • source: Newsweek on BRUNELLESCHI'S DOME
   • content: One of architecture's great tales.
8. • premium: False
   • source: Miami Herald on MICHELANGELO AND THE POPE'S CEILING
   • content: Scrupulously researched, written with wit and panache, Ross King's Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling is a sublime peek into a remarkable era.
9. • premium: False
   • source: Charles Nicholl, Guardian
   • content: The story of Leonardo's creation of the work has now found an ideal chronicler in Ross King, author of Brunelleschi's Dome and Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling, which have won plaudits for their concise, close-focus study of great renaissance achievements. King has the gift of clear, unpretentious exposition, and an instinctive narrative flair.
10. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      May 21, 2012
      Detail obsessed, easily distracted, and a notorious deadline-buster, Leonardo da Vinci was able to complete one of his two best works in just three years—all against a backdrop of war and occupation of Milan. King’s (Michelangelo and the Pope’s Ceiling) detailed accounting of the political situation in 15th-century Italy and how it informs our understanding of The Last Supper is interspersed with analysis of history’s many interpretations of the painting, including the “typical crackpottery that follows Leonardo.” The book addresses such topics as the groupings of the apostles and their hand placement; readings of the painting as glorifying faith; and whether the figure next to Jesus depicts the apostle John or Mary Magdalene. King provides a fascinating look at the artist’s life, including his reputation among his patrons as unreliable, and his relationships with those he worked with and for—including a young boy named Giacomo, who “held a great physical attraction for Leonardo.” However, King’s speculations are never salacious; rather, they help place Leonardo’s life into the context of Florence’s history of sexual tolerance and subsequent religious crackdowns. Though some of King’s political explorations and discussions of symbolism can drag, the book proves most lively when tackling common misconceptions about the painting, with The Da Vinci Code coming in for special criticism. 16-page color insert and b&w reproductions. Agent: Christopher Sinclair-Stevenson.

11. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      Starred review from September 1, 2012
      An absorbing study of a disappearing masterpiece. King (Defiant Spirits: The Modernist Revolution of the Group of Seven, 2010, etc.) tells the story of the most famous painting no one has really seen, at least since the 16th century: The Last Supper, the masterpiece by Leonardo da Vinci that began deteriorating almost as soon as the paint dried. King places the painting in its political, social and artistic context, describing both the meaning of da Vinci's work and the violent 15th-century Italian world that spawned it. Proof that art, like life, sometimes happens when you're making other plans, da Vinci's greatest painting came about because his dream project--an enormous horse-and-rider sculpture honoring the father of his patron, Lodovico Sforza--was scuttled when Italy needed the bronze for war. For the next two years, da Vinci painted the scene of Jesus and his disciples on the wall of a monastery. In its masterful use of perspective, complementary color and achievement of lifelike detail, it marked a turning point for Western art. King plumbs the painting's religious, secular, psychological and political meanings, registered in the facial expressions and hand positions, the significance of the food on the table and, most fascinatingly, the salt spilled by the betraying Judas. (And no, Dan Brown, Mary Magdalene is not in it.) Alas, da Vinci's ignorance of the fresco technique meant the pigments did not bond to the plaster, and the paint would begin flaking within years. As early as 1582, it was described as being "in a state of total ruin." Thankfully, King's book is an impressive work of restoration--the author helps readers see this painting for the first time.

      COPYRIGHT(2012) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

12. • premium: True
    • source:
    • content:

      Starred review from August 1, 2012
      

      King (Brunelleschi's Dome) celebrates Leonardo da Vinci in this engaging biography centered on the artist's creation of one of his masterpieces, The Last Supper, in Santa Maria della Grazia in Milan. He touches upon some of the major forces of Leonardo's time: Lodovico Sforza, the Duke of Milan, who commissioned the painting to glorify the Sforza dynasty; Charles XIII of France, whose troops invaded and, for a time, ruled parts of Italy; as well as the ecclesiastic fabric of Renaissance life, which supported the creation of many great works of art. King explores Leonardo's painting techniques and explores many factors that may have figured into its creation such as the divinely inspired proportion of the golden section (knowledge derived from Leonardo's relationship with the mathematician Luca Pacioli) as well as an explication of the various poses of the figures in the painting itself, which King speculates might be based on gestures commonly used by 15th-century Italians. VERDICT A fascinating and in-depth story of one of the world's most famous works of art that will appeal to general readers as well as academics. Highly recommended.--Ellen Bates, New York

      Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

popularity

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Early in 1495, Leonardo da Vinci began work in Milan on what would become one of history's most influential and beloved works of art—The Last Supper. After a dozen years at the court of Lodovico Sforza, the Duke of Milan, Leonardo was at a low point personally and professionally: at 43, in an era when he had almost reached the average life expectancy, he had failed, despite a number of prestigious commissions, to complete anything that truly fulfilled his astonishing promise. His latest failure was a giant bronze horse to honor Sforza's father: his 75 tons of bronze had been expropriated to be turned into cannon to help repel a French invasion of Italy. The commission to paint The Last Supper in the refectory of a Dominican convent was a small compensation, and his odds of completing it were not promising: Not only had he never worked on a painting of such a large size—15' high x 30' wide—but he had no experience in the extremely difficult medium of...

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awards

1. • source: Notable Books Council
   • value: Notable Books for Adults
2. • source: Governor General of Canada
   • value: Governor General's Literary Award

publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing

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1. • code: ART015070
   • description: ART / History / European / Medieval
2. • code: ART035000
   • description: Art / Subjects & Themes / Religious
3. • code: BIO001000
   • description: Biography & Autobiography / Artists, Architects, Photographers