LEONARDO DA VINCI 1452-1519

Leonardo da VINCI Vinci, 1452–Amboise, 1519 Study of the Virgin and Child, known as Madonna with a Fruit Bowl Leadpoint reworked with pen and brown ink About 1478–1480 The Madonna with a Fruit Bowl illustrates the remarkable freedom that suddenly infused Leonardo’s art. Jesus appears to be offering his mother a piece of fruit, symbolising the eradication of original sin. Unlike Leonardo’s previous drawings, this sketch does not attempt to clearly define the forms; instead, it seems to rage against them in an extraordinary struggle to capture the essential reality of movement .This drawing is strongly reminiscent of the Benois Madonna (no. 040). The Madonna with a Fruit Bowl belonged to the great collector Horace His de La Salle, whose drawings are currently on display in the Louvre. Department of Prints and Drawings, Musée du Louvre, Paris, RF 486 0 28 0 29 Leonardo da VINCI Vinci, 1452–Amboise, 1519 Female head Silverpoint and metalpoint, heightened with white, on pale grey prepared paper About 1485–1490 This drawing attests to Leonardo’s expertise in the use of silverpoint – a virtuoso technique allowing for no corrections.The loose, confident lines transcribe the slightest variations of light and shade with beautiful simplicity.This drawing probably served as a model for the Madonna Litta (now in the Hermitage Museum), once attributed to Leonardo but more likely by Giovanni Antonio Boltraffio or Marco d’Oggiono, two of the master’s future pupils in Milan. Department of Prints and Drawings, Musée du Louvre, Paris, Inv. 2376