Additional print information "The Last Supper (Leonardo da Vinci Improvisation)" (buy oil painting)
Tags "The Last Supper (Leonardo da Vinci Improvisation)" (buy oil painting)
Additional information "The Last Supper (Leonardo da Vinci Improvisation)" (buy oil painting)
Leonardo da Vinci |
The Last Supper measures 450×870 cm and covers the back wall of the dining hall at the monastery of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan, Italy. The Last Supper specifically portrays the reaction given by each apostle when Jesus said one of them would betray him. All twelve apostles have different reactions to the news, with various degrees of anger and shock. The apostles are identified from a manuscript (The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci p. 232) with their names found in the 19th century. (Before this, only Judas, Peter, John and Jesus were positively identified.) In common with other depictions of The Last Supper from this period, Leonardo seats the diners on one side of the table, so that none of them have their backs to the viewer. Most previous depictions excluded Judas by placing him alone on the opposite side of the table from the other eleven disciples and Jesus or placing halos around all the disciples except Judas. Leonardo instead has Judas lean back into shadow. Jesus is predicting that his betrayer will take the bread at the same time he does to Saints Thomas and James to his left, who react in horror as Jesus points with his left hand to a piece of bread before them. Distracted by the conversation between John and Peter, Judas reaches for a different piece of bread not noticing Jesus too stretching out with his right hand towards it. (Matthew 26: 23). The angles and lighting draw attention to Jesus, whose head is located at the vanishing point for all perspective lines. Via |