Milan had a famous university. But it was not a center for famous artists like Florence was. But Ludovico Sforza was very interested in the arts. The duke liked to give big parties. He like to put on pageants. He also wanted someone to design new weapons for him. (The city-states were often at war with one another.)
All of this interested Leonardo. He wrote a letter to the duke. In it, he listed everything he was good at. Some of it was bragging. He said he could design buildings and bridges, warships and huge cannons. Nobody knows if Leonardo ever sent the letter. There also is a story about a present that Leonardo gave the duke. The duke loved music. Leonardo did, too. So he made a lute. (This was like a violin, with strings and a bow.) It was made of silver—and was in the shape of a horse’s skull! It had to be played upside down. Whether this is true or not, one thing is certain: The duke did eventually hire Leonardo.
So off Leonardo went to Milan. Whatever the duke wanted, Leonardo would create. He worked for the duke for many years, until the duke was forced from power.
When the duke’s nephew was married, there was a huge feast. Leonardo was in charge of the party after the feast. He built incredible stage sets. They were for a play known as The Feast of Paradise. What a spectacle it must have been: A mountain was split in two; inside it was a beautiful model of the heavens. Actors in fancy costumes represented the different planets. The twelve signs of the zodiac were lit by torches. Everything turned around and around.
Some of Leonardo’s work was much more practical. He found a better way to heat the water for the duchess’s bath. He also built a series of canals. Another project was something Leonardo worked on for years and was never able to finish; even at the end of his life, he was still dreaming about his “horse.”
The duke wanted a giant statue of a horse. The statue was to honor the memory of his father. He didn’t want it to just be big—he wanted it to be huge. The biggest ever. For years, Leonardo made sketches of how the horse statue might look. He studied the horses in the duke’s stables. He made wax models. He even cut into the muscles and bones of dead horses. He wanted to know horses inside and out.
Leonardo’s horse was to be more than three times the size of a real horse. Its front right leg would be lifted. It would be made of bronze. Eighty tons of metal were needed for a statue this big.
After ten years on the project, Leonardo finished a full-sized model of the horse in clay. It stood in the courtyard of the duke’s castle. It was twenty-four feet high. Now everyone in Milan came to see what the statue would look like. And they all agreed: There had never been anything like it. But Leonardo still had much work ahead of him. He made molds from clay for the different parts of the statue. After that, hot bronze would be poured into the molds. This was going to be a very tricky process, too. If the metal wasn’t poured fast enough, it would crack as it grew hard. But Leonardo figured out how to avoid the cracking.
The duke collected all the metal that Leonardo needed. It really seemed as if the fabulous bronze statue would be made. But Leonardo never got to use the metal for his horse.
By 1494, the duke was afraid that soldiers from France were going to attack. What happened to all that bronze? The duke made it into cannons. Even so, the cannons did not stop the French. They took over Milan in 1499.
And what happened to Leonardo’s giant clay horse? The French used it for target practice. They shot arrows into it until it was completely destroyed. There was nothing left of all those long years of work. Leonardo’s dream turned into dust.
It was not Leonardo’s fault that the horse was never finished. However, another important job for the duke also came to an unhappy end. And this time, Leonardo was partly to blame.
Near the duke’s castle was a monastery, a place where monks lived and prayed and studied. The duke planned to be buried there one day. He wanted Leonardo to paint a picture on one of the walls in the dining hall. This kind of painting is called a fresco. The most beautiful kind of fresco is also the hardest kind of painting to do. Water-based paint is put directly onto fresh plaster that hasn’t dried. (In Italian, fresco means “fresh.”) The artist must work quickly, and once the paint is brushed on, the artist can’t go back and make changes.
The dining hall in the monastery was a very large room. It was big enough for fifty monks to eat in. Leonardo decided to choose a scene from the end of Jesus’ life. He and his twelve followers are shown at a dinner table. This was a good choice for a painting in a dining hall. It is a very dramatic moment. Jesus tells his followers that one of them is going to betray him.
Leonardo made many drawings of ways to show thirteen figures seated at a table. He wandered through the streets of Milan looking for people to put in his fresco.
The fresco was to be painted on the wall so that it seemed to be part of the dining hall. It would be almost as if Jesus and his followers were in the same room with the monks. Even the table and the dishes in the painting were the same kind the monks used.
The fresco is called The Last Supper and is one of the most famous works of art in the world. Gentlemen from Milan would travel to the monastery to watch Leonardo paint. He didn’t mind. In fact, he liked to hear their opinions of the picture.
A seventeen-year-old boy often came to watch, too. He grew up to be a writer and left accounts of The Last Supper. He wrote that sometimes Leonardo would come into the dining hall very early in the morning. He would paint the entire day from sunrise to sunset. He would not even stop to eat or drink anything. Then, on other days, he would stand in front of the painting and scold himself. It wasn’t good enough. And sometimes he would dash in from working on the horse statue. He would make one or two brushstrokes and then leave.
In the fresco, Jesus is shown in the center, with six men on either side of him. He looks very calm but sad. The followers react to his news with horror. Each side seems to back away from him, like a shock wave. One of the men, however, seems separated from the group. He is leaning forward, his arm on the table. He is named Judas. And he is the one who will betray Jesus.
By 1497 The Last Supper was completed. It was so lifelike and so dramatic. All over Italy people talked about this beautiful, moving painting. Leonardo was known now as the greatest master of his day. Copies of The Last Supper were made by other artists. Engravings were made for people all over Europe to buy. Five hundred years later, it is still considered a work of genius.
So why isn’t this a happy ending? It’s because of damage to the painting. The Last Supper started to crack and peel less than fifty years after Leonardo finished it. It was Leonardo’s fault.
Leonardo didn’t like working on frescoes the regular way. He wanted to be able to go back and make changes. So instead, he tried something new. He put varnish on the wall and then painted it with tempera paints. Leonardo was always experimenting. This was one experiment that was a big mistake.
Today, much of the wall painting has flaked off. Many of the faces are only half there. The colors are faded. Experts have tried to restore The Last Supper. They have made improvements. Still, there is a great deal of damage to this masterpiece. It is probably lucky that Leonardo can’t see how it looks.
The duke was a good patron to Leonardo for many years. He kept Leonardo very busy. He also let him take jobs from other rich people in Milan.
It was in Milan that Leonardo took in a poor, ten-year-old boy. The year was 1490. The boy’s name was Giacomo, but Leonardo called him Salai. That was a slang word meaning “rascal” or “demon.” Salai was indeed a rascal. He lied. He broke things. He stole money from Leonardo and Leonardo’s friends. In his notebooks, Leonardo wrote that Salai ate as much as two boys and made as much trouble as four.
Even so, Leonardo was very fond of Salai. He enjoyed spoiling him with presents. No matter how badly Salai behaved, Leonardo never asked him to leave. Salai stayed with him for the rest of Leonardo’s life. Wherever Leonardo traveled, Salai went, too. He may have done chores for Leonardo. But he was much more important to him than a servant. Leonardo was not close to many people. He enjoyed being alone, free to think. He never had a family of his own. Perhaps Salai was the one person who was almost like family. |