Movatterモバイル変換

Bacchus (Leonardo)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Painting attributed to Leonardo da Vinci

Bacchus

Artist	Francesco Melzi, Workshop ofLeonardo da Vinci
Year	1510–1515
Type	Oil on walnut panel transferred to canvas
Dimensions	177 cm × 115 cm (70 in × 45 in)
Location	Louvre,Paris

Bacchus is seen here after recent restoration work. Colors closer to original and details are better visible again.

Bacchus, originallySaint John the Baptist, is a painting in theMusée du Louvre,Paris,France, by theItalian Renaissance artistLeonardo da Vinci andFrancesco Melzi, while in Leonardo's workshop.Sydney J. Freedberg assigns the drawing to Leonardo's second Milan period.^[1] Among the Lombard painters who have been suggested as possible authors areCesare da Sesto,^[a]Marco d'Oggiono,Francesco Melzi,^[2] andCesare Bernazzano. The painting shows a male figure with garlanded head and leopard skin loincloth, seated in an idyllic landscape. He points with his right hand off to his left, and with his left hand grasps histhyrsus and also points down to earth.

The painting originally depictedJohn the Baptist. In the late 17th century, between the years 1683 and 1693, it was overpainted and altered to serve asBacchus.^[b]

The model for theJohn the Baptist /Bacchus /Angelo incarnato series wasSalaì.^[3]

Cassiano dal Pozzo remarked of the painting in its former state, which he saw atFontainebleau in 1625, that it had neither devotion, decorum nor similitude,^[4] the suavely beautiful, youthful and slightly androgynousGiovannino was so at variance with artistic conventions in portraying the Baptist – neither the older ascetic prophet nor the Florentine babyGiovannino, but a type of Leonardo's invention, of a disconcerting, somewhat ambiguous sensuality, familiar in Leonardo's half-length and upward-pointingSaint John the Baptist, also in the Louvre.^[5]

The overpainting transformed the image of St. John into one of a pagan deity, by converting the long-handled cross-like staff of the Baptist to a Bacchic thyrsus and adding a vine wreath. The fur robe is the legacy of John the Baptist, but has been overpainted with leopard-spots relating, like the wreath, to Bacchus, the Roman god of wine and intoxication.

Copies

[edit]

Few copies done byLeonardeschi artists are known. One of them is attributed toBernardino Lanino (panel, 24 x 24 cm) and is held at theNational Gallery of Scotland, Edinburgh. It depicts St John the Baptist in Wilderness. However, the saint is placed to a background of grotto with some sight of high rocks, a river, riders and a hanged man. Another copy of 15th-16th centuries is held at Musee Ingres, Montauban. Another copy, attributed to follower ofCesare da Sesto was sold in auction atChristie's on 23 April 2008.

References

[edit]

Footnotes

[edit]

^Cesare is most often credited with the best of three copies of this work in its original formulation, on loan to theNational Gallery of Scotland.
^It was inventoried in 1683 atSaint Jean dans le désert at Fontainebleau and in 1693 atMeudon asBacchus, with a marginal note that it had been previously inventoried asSaint John. (Freedberg 1982:285, note 16).

Citations

[edit]

^S.J. Freedberg, "A Recovered Work of Andrea del Sarto with Some Notes on a Leonardesque Connection"The Burlington Magazine124 No. 950 (May 1982:266, 281–288) p. 285; the badly smudged and damaged red chalk drawing, conserved in the Museo del Santuario del Sacro Monte, Varese, is illustrated p.284, fig. 27.
^Freedberg 1982, p. 285
^Pedretti, Carlo (2009).Leonardo da Vinci : l'Angelo incarnato & Salai = the Angel in the flesh & Salai. Margherita Melani, Daniel Arasse, da Vinci Leonardo. Foligno (Perugia): Cartei & Bianchi. p. 201.ISBN 978-88-95686-11-0.OCLC 500794484.
^Noted by A. Ottino della Chiesa,Leonardo Pittore (Milan) 1967:109, from a document in theVatican Library.
^See Marilyn Aronberg Lavin, "Giovannino Battista: A Study in Renaissance Religious Symbolism"The Art Bulletin37.2. (June 1955:85-101).

Studies for theVirgin of the Rocks	Designs for an Adoration of the Christ Child Head of the Angel Head of the Infant Saint John the Baptist
Studies for theLast Supper	Head of Christ
Relating to theVirgin and Child with Saint Anne	The Virgin and Child with Saint Anne and Saint John the Baptist (London cartoon) Second cartoon (lost) Christ Child Drapery of the Virgin's Legs Drapery of the Virgin's Right Arm Head of Saint Anne Head of the Virgin