Leonardo, The Last Supper - Tapa dura

"This massive volume testifies to a great love of both Leonardo's crumbling masterpieces and the meticulous craft of art restoration. . . . Although this most recent and ambitious restoration is controversial, the results-------exhaustively photographed here, in full-scale as well as reductions--are impressive, with lines emerging as simultaneously more subtle and more forceful, and the shadows, particularly in the striking figure of Philip, as more mysterious and tender."--Laura Miller "Salon " "This extraordinary volume, which documents the technical history of the two-decade-long restoration in the context of the broader history of the work itself, is what art historians have been waiting for. As a work of art itself, this book is produced with elegance, care, and refinement. . . . Between the two essays are contained 249 pages of the most breathtakingly beautiful photographs in modern art history, produced by Antonio Quattrone. These photographs alone justify the publication of this book, for, through their probing depth and sensitivity, we may not only wonder anew about the wisdom of restoration (not a subject for this review) but allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by the realization of how little of that precious original paint remains as touches of small jewelry defining a wretched corpse. . . . This handsome volume, with its magnificent photographs and two informative essays, will be of great interest not only to scholars, historians, and visual artists but to all those who have interests in Renaissance painting, Leonardo da Vinci, and the science of conservation."--Sixteenth Century Journal "Pinin Barcilon was entrusted with the unenviable task of restoring the mural--again. Her highly controversial approach has been to pry away every bit of paint not clearly Leonardo's, with the result that a pale but evocative ghost remains. Was too much removed? Readers can judge by perusing the extraordinary 1:1 scale photographs of sections from the painting."--Christopher Benfey "The New York Times Book Review " "All the technical detail a scholar could want is here, but even readers with little interest in it will find absorbing the almost inch-by-inch record of the painting in superb color photographs."--San Francisco Chronicle Book Review "[A] text and color photographs that document the results of a 20-year conservation project recently completed. Pleasure at revelations of Leonardo's hand are overwhelmed by a sense of sadness at how much is irretrievably lost."--A. Richard Turner "Los Angeles Times Book Revew " "The cleaning of the Last Supper . . . could never promise a return to original splendor once the layers of dirt and repaint were removed. For it was generally known that little of Leonardo's painted surface was there to be rediscovered. What little there is has now been brought to light, and is splendidly illustrated, in the weighty volume by Pinin Brambilla Barcilon and Pietro C. Marani. . . . The excellent color plates in this book are at once revealing and dismaying. Displaying in remarkable detail what is left of Leonardo's painting, they introduce us to details and colors that we could hardly have appreciated before: the delicately rendered utensils and food on the table, the embroidered blue pattern on the tablecloth, and the nuanced rendering of its crisp folds."--David Rosand "The New Republic " "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. . . . The 382 color plates and 64 halftones in the lush, slipcased edition are accompanied by extensive, cogent commentary."--Publishers Weekly

This is the official record of the restoration of Leonardo's painting "The Last Supper". It documents the cleaning and removal of the overpainting performed in other attempts at restoration, then looks at the watercolour additions of Barcilon, which were based on Leonardo's preparatory drawings, early copies of the painting and contemporary textual descriptions. The book details the reproduction process and distinguishes from the fresco Leonardo's hand from that of the restorers. Barcilon documents the technical aspects of the restoration, while art historian, Pietro C. Marani focuses on the history of the fresco, from conception through to restoration.