The history and all the curiosities surrounding Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper. The best ways to visit the Cenacolo Vinciano in Milan, including ticket information.
An absolute masterpiece of art housed in Milan, in the former refectory of Santa Maria delle Grazie: the Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci is the work that first represented not simply a religious scene but also the inner emotions of its protagonists. The fruit of a supreme genius's labour, it has always suffered from its great fragility. An unmissable stop for anyone visiting Milan.
Ernst Gombrich, the great art historian, described Leonardo as a genius "whose powerful mind will forever remain an object of wonder and admiration for ordinary mortals." For him, as for many others, the greatness of this artist lay above all in his hunger for knowledge and discovery, in his never-satisfied mind: whatever field he investigated, he never accepted only what he read without verifying it through his own studies.
All his genius across many disciplines — not only painting — is plainly evident in his perhaps most famous yet most damaged work, the Last Supper, created at the behest of the Duke of Milan Ludovico il Moro between 1494 and 1498 on a wall of the rectangular room that served as the refectory for the friars of the convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie. It was the first time a sacred episode had appeared so close and so true to life. The apostles and Christ seem to be seated right beside the friars, and one can almost still hear the echo of the words Jesus had just spoken: "One of you will betray me." Everything is painted down to the finest detail: the food and utensils on the table, the perspective is perfect; but what radically changed the history of art was Leonardo's ability to render feelings, the emotional states of the figures. An absolute novelty — the greatness of a genius.
The Novelle of Matteo Bandello, a sixteenth-century Italian writer, tell us just how much this masterpiece cost Leonardo. He wrote that the artist held his brush day and night, and sometimes did not descend from the scaffolding for days. Years of unrelenting work that nonetheless produced a masterpiece of short-lived duration.
The Cenacolo Vinciano is often mistakenly described as a fresco, but it is now well established that Leonardo chose, for stylistic reasons, to use a different technique — an entirely new one — that involved applying a relatively rough plaster onto which the main lines of the composition would then be traced, as though it were a panel painting. Before the dry pigments were laid down — made up of a fatty tempera probably prepared by emulsifying thinning oils with egg — Leonardo interposed a material intended to enhance the luminous effects.
This technique allowed for a particular richness of paint built up from small brushstrokes that enabled the rendering of transparencies and light effects, as well as an extreme attention to detail visible only at close range; but it was also the origin of the conservation problems afflicting the work, compounded by the damp from the adjoining kitchens. What we find today is only a pale shadow of the magnificent painting the Last Supper once was — something we can appreciate by looking at one of the many copies made at the time, such as that by Giampietrino, Leonardo's pupil, now held in London.
But why did Leonardo use this fragile technique? The hypothesis that the artist did not fresco the wall because he had not experimented with the method while working in Verrocchio's workshop is unlikely. When Leonardo was called upon to produce mural paintings, he drew on his knowledge of easel painting because he had an idea of perfection that was incompatible with the speed required of a painter working on freshly laid plaster. He thus chose to paint in tempera on the wall because only a technique that allowed him the slow, meticulous development of the work would have enabled him to achieve miniature-like detail. Fresco would also not have permitted the revisions which, as we now know thanks to the restorations carried out on the Cenacolo, were numerous: Leonardo modified — almost updated — the work, also in response to the light, in his effort to strive towards his own perfection, however fleeting and fragile.
The anecdotes and curiosities surrounding the painting and Leonardo are plentiful, as are the theories about the symbolism and hidden meanings of the Cenacolo. What is certain is that every day tourists arrive from every corner of the world eager to see this masterpiece, even if only for a few minutes. Restored over more than 20 years, the Last Supper has been open to visitors since 1999 under strict rules: entry is by reservation only, by clicking here. The ticket costs 10 euros, to which a 2-euro booking fee must be added, and, if a guided tour in Italian or English is desired, a further 3.50 euros per person (available at certain times only). Groups are limited to 25 people per visit and last 15 minutes: a sophisticated air-purification system makes it possible to approach the work without damaging it, but it should be noted that filming and flash photography are strictly prohibited.
If you would like a more in-depth visit that covers not only the work itself but also the cultural and historical context in which the Last Supper was created, there is the option of booking an hour-and-a-half guided tour with an art expert through Milanoarte: the prices differ from those of the standard visit, but so too does the level of attention and the amount of information provided.
Opposite Santa Maria delle Grazie it is also possible to visit La vigna di Leonardo, opened for Expo in 2015 and still accessible today. The ticket costs 10 euros and all the information can be found here. For a comprehensive overview of Leonardo's genius, a trip to the nearby and charming town of Vigevano is a must, for Leonardiana. Un museo nuovo, where an itinerary is on display tracing the full body of work that Leonardo managed to conceive and realise throughout his life.