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Supposed Leonardo da Vinci Work RevealedRecent Italian Monograph Describes Profile of a Young Fiancée
A new book about Italian Renaissance artist Leonardo da Vinci presents "Profile of a Young Fiancée" as a recently discovered work from the master's first Milanese period.
Alessandro Vezzosi, Director of Italy's Museo Ideale Leonardo da Vinci, includes the portrait in Leonardo Infinito, published by Bologna's Scriptamaneant Editzioni on July 5, 2008. A private Swiss collector purchased Profile of a Young Fiancée at a January 1998 Christie's New York auction. At the time of the restored work's acquisition, it was mistakenly attributed to an anonymous German artist of the early 19th Century, having made $21,850 for a presumed Nazarene work surprising. AttributionProfile of a Young Fiancée (ca. 1485) was first attributed to Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) by Nicholas Turner, formerly the Deputy Keeper of Prints and Drawings at the British Museum (1974-1994) and Curator of Drawings at the J. Paul Getty Museum (1994-1998). Turner's valuable insight has since been supported by respected Leonardo experts Carlo Pedretti, Alessandro Vezzosi. Mina Gregori and Cristina Geddo. The scholars' findings have been corroborated by the results of multi-spectral digital photography and other technical analyses conducted by Parisians Pascal Cotte and Jean Penicaut of Lumière Technology. Cotte's groundbreaking methods have enabled the public to see convincingly how Leonardo's Lady with an Ermine (1490-91) and Mona Lisa (1503-16) appeared when the artist first painted them. Physical CharacteristicsProfile of a Young Fiancée was sensitively drawn in white, red and black chalks with watercolor additions on vellum. The mixed-media composition, measuring 23.87 x 33.27 cm (9.39 x 13.09 in.), was strengthened with an oak panel backing subsequent to its execution. The work was also overpainted during a restoration that occurred most probably in the 19th Century. Facing left, the presumed betrothed subject, devoid of jewelry, is dressed in sumptuous Renaissance attire. A triangular opening in her costume's sleeve reveals embroidery with elaborate Leonardesque knots. The sitter's coiffure is stylistically consonant with 15th-century Lombard fashion. The woman's hair, neatly braided in a Milanese coazzone, cascades down her spine, held in place by a series of ribbons. The Sitter's IdentityLeonardo Infinito presents a compelling argument for Profile of a Young Fiancée being an example of female Renaissance portraits produced for distant prospective grooms. Comparisons have been made with the Galleria degli Uffizi's Portrait of Battista Sforza (ca. 1465) by Piero della Francesca and the Thyssen-Bornemisza Collection's Portrait of Giovanna Tornabuoni (1488) by Domenico Ghirlandaio, among others. Vezzosi conjectures that Leonardo's subject may have been Bianca Maria Sforza, the Milanese bride of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I (r. 1508-1519). In the absence of documentary evidence, the subject's identity remains elusive. Interpreting the PortraitCarlo Pedretti is the Director of the Armand Hammer Center for Leonardo Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles. In his introduction to Leonardo Infinito, the veritable dean of Leonardo scholars supports Vezzosi's restrained and preliminary conclusions about the portrait's authorship pending further scientific investigation. Determining the dates of both the parchment and its drawing materials is crucial to the image's authentication. Despite recent technological advancements, art historians are reluctant to admit so-called newly discovered images into the accepted canon of Leonardo da Vinci's works. Considering the limited number of the artist's completed compositions, hesitation is justified. The fact that Profile of a Young Fiancée was produced on vellum, an oddity in itself, fuels academic skepticism and healthy debate. Source:
The copyright of the article Supposed Leonardo da Vinci Work Revealed in Curating Art is owned by Stan Parchin. Permission to republish Supposed Leonardo da Vinci Work Revealed in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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