Adoration of the Magi of the Orient (Leonardo da Vinci)
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| Adoration of the Magi of the Orient |
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| Leonardo da Vinci , around 1481 |
| oil on wood |
| 247 × 246 cm |
| Galleria degli Uffizi , Florence |
The Adoration of the Magi of the Orient ( Italian Adorazione dei Magi ) is a painting by the Italian Renaissance artist Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519). The unfinished work is dated around 1481 and is in the holdings of the Uffizi Gallery in Florence .
The work
The painting was intended as an altarpiece for the Monastery of San Donato in Scopeto . The monastery complex was located near the city of Florence, in front of the Porta Romana . Why Leonardo, who went from Florence to Milan in 1482, did not complete the picture is not known. In 1496 the monks of San Donato commissioned Filippino Lippi for an altarpiece on the same theme. Lippi's picture, which is also kept in the Uffizi, is based closely on Leonardo's inventions in the composition.
What has been preserved is an almost monochrome oil drawing in the format 246.7 × 246.5 cm, with partly detailed, partly only roughly sketched figures, architectural elements and some almost completely executed trees. There are also several sheets with preparatory studies.
The depiction of the adoration of the Magi is a traditional subject in Christian painting. The special thing about Leonardo's composition is above all the novel structure. Previously, the kings and shepherds were arranged horizontally side by side. Leonardo groups the figures around the Madonna as the center. The seemingly arbitrary distribution finds a balance in the strict triangular composition in which the main characters are embedded. Faces and gestures impressively convey the reality of the miracle that presents itself to their eyes.
The Leonardo biographer Charles Nicholl suspects that the young Leonardo da Vinci depicted himself on the lower right edge of the painting.
- Leonardo's Studies on the Adoration of the Magi of the Orient
literature
- Martin Kemp : Leonardo . Beck, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-406-56821-3
- Charles Nicholl : Leonardo da Vinci - The biography . S. Fischer, Frankfurt am Main 2006, ISBN 978-3-10-052405-8
- Jack Wassermann: Leonardo da Vinci . 2nd edition, DuMont, Cologne 1983
Web links
Individual evidence
The last supper | The Adoration of the Magi of the Orient | The adoration of the child with two angels in a landscape (2) | Anna herself third | Bacchus | Portrait of the Mona Lisa | Portrait of Ginevra de 'Benci | Portrait of a musician (2) | The lady with the ermine | The Madonna of the Rocks | Saint Jerome | John the Baptist | La Belle Ferronnière (2) | La Bella Principessa (2) | Leda with the swan (†) | Madonna Benois | Madonna Dreyfus (2) | Madonna Litta (2) | Madonna with the Carnation | Madonna with the spindle (†) | Salvator Mundi | The Scapigliata | The Battle of Anghiari (†) | Tobias and the Angel (1) | The baptism of Christ (1) | The Annunciation (1)
(†) missing • (1) Andrea del Verrocchio and Leonardo da Vinci • (2) Attribution controversial