Lady with an ermine
|
| Lady with an ermine |
|---|
| Leonardo da Vinci , 1489/1490 |
| Oil and tempera on panel |
| 54.7 x 40.3 cm |
| Czartoryski Museum, Krakow |
The lady with an ermine is one of the four portraits of women painted by Leonardo da Vinci . The painting has been in the collection of the Kraków Czartoryski Museum since 1880 .
Emergence
The painting was made by Leonardo da Vinci in Milan in 1489/1490 on behalf of the Duke of Milan Ludovico Sforza - called Il Moro . The picture is 54.7 × 40.3 cm. It depicts Cecilia Gallerani (1473–1536), who was Ludovico Sforza's mistress from 1489 to 1491 . The sitter was then 16 or 17 years old. The white ermine she is holding on her left arm alludes to her role as a mistress, as Ludovico Sforza was nicknamed “white ermine”. Ludovico Sforza was the bearer of the Order of Ermine donated by King Ferdinand I of Naples . In addition, the ermine alludes to the name of the portrayed Gallerani, as weasel means γαλέη (galée) in ancient Greek .
Such allusions to names can also be found in other portraits of Leonardo da Vinci. The face of Ginevra de 'Benci is framed by a juniper , Italian ginepro , and the smile of the Mona Lisa , whose full name was Lisa del Giocondo (in German: Lise von Heiter), is proverbially known. Mona is the abbreviation for Madonna (in German: "My Lady").
The portrait was painted in three phases, as technical studies with a high-resolution spectral camera show. At first only the portrayed lady with a different hand position, the right hand grasping the left arm, and without an ermine. Then the lady with the narrow, gray ermine in summer fur. And finally the lady with a well-fed white ermine in winter fur. The subsequent addition of the ermine is possibly related to the birth of their son Cesare, born on May 3, 1491, who was born from Ludovico Sforza's liaison with Cecilia Gallerani, as the winter ermine also because of its white ("pure") fur was the protective animal of the pregnant woman.
- The four portraits of women by Leonardo da Vinci
Portrait of Ginevra de 'Benci , 1474 - 1478
Lady with an Ermine, 1489/1490
Mona Lisa , 1503-1506
-_la_Belle_Ferroniere.jpg)
description
The picture shows a young woman in precious garb. Her straight parted hair is covered with a transparent cap ( cuffia ) made of gauze , the gold edge of which can be seen just above the eyebrows and the straps run below the chin. The hood is held in place by a narrow horizontal strap ( lenza ). She wears a short pigtail at the back of her head. Around her neck is a double long and short wound pearl necklace made of dark blue decorated pearls, possibly made of ebony . She is holding a white ermine in winter fur on her left arm, and she is holding her right hand below his neck.
history
The history of the image was only further researched from the beginning of the 20th century.
The painting was acquired in 1800 by Prince Adam Jerzy Czartoryski and given to his mother Izabela Czartoryska . It was exhibited in the “Gothic House” in the Czartoryski Residence in Puławy . It was brought to Paris during the November Uprising of 1831 . It was acquired by the Czartoryski Museum in Krakow around 1880 . In 1939, immediately after the conquest of Poland, it was confiscated by the German authorities and taken to the Bode Museum in Berlin. In 1940, the Governor General Hans Frank requested the return to Krakow, where it served as a wall decoration in his residence in the Wawel Castle . During the escape, it was taken to Germany in 1944. After the World War, American troops found the stolen painting in Frank's country house in Bavaria and brought it back to Krakow.
At the end of 2016, the Polish state bought the important Czartoryski art collection, including the painting Lady with an Ermine, “at a low price” .
Technical investigations
An X-ray examination in Washington in 1992 was the first to prove that the background originally showed a gray-blue drawing that was obviously painted over later.
Pascal Cotte from Lumiere Technology then carried out an examination of the image in 2007 with a high-resolution (240 million pixels) multispectral (13 channels from ultraviolet to infrared ) camera, which made it possible to make individual layers of paint visible (LAM, Layer Amplification Method , “layer reinforcing method "). It turned out that the portrait was painted in three phases.
Art historical significance
The portrait of a lady with an ermine is one of the most important paintings of the changing portrait art of the Renaissance and shows some of Leonardo da Vinci's innovative techniques. It is very likely that this form of portrait was the model for many other artistic depictions of personalities of the time.
Mathematical Aspects
As in many paintings by Leonardo da Vinci , a golden ratio can be seen in several places . Three examples in this picture should make this clear. The green dots represent three prominent parts of the painting (chin of the lady and an ear and a paw of the ermine). They divide the stretches they are on with great precision in the golden ratio. All three points are also on a common straight line that runs parallel to the side of the picture.
Trivia
The painting appears in the horror video game Layers of Fear , released in 2016, and adorns the protagonist's house, along with many other works of art. During the descent into the shattering psyche of the character, the lady with the ermine changes in front of the player in a repulsive way into the image Rat with the Lady , which was created by Bartosz Kapron, one of the artists of the Bloober Team development studio based on the lady was created. The painting also forms the cover of Enigma's 2009 album The Platinum Collection .
bibliography
- Frank Zöllner : Leonardo da Vinci 1452-1519. Taschen Verlag, Cologne 1999, ISBN 3-8228-6363-7 .
- Daniela Pizzagalli: La Dama Con L'ermellino: Vita E Passioni Di Cecilia Gallerani Nella Milano Di Ludovico Il Moro. Rizzoli Editore, Milan 1999, ISBN 88-17-86073-5 .
- Max Seydewitz , Ruth Seydewitz : The lady with the ermine: The greatest art theft of all time. Henschel, Berlin 1963
- Keith Christiansen, Stefan Weppelmann : Faces of the Renaissance. Hirmer Verlag, Munich, 2011, ISBN 978-3-88609-706-7 , pp. 70ff.
Web links
- "Www.dame-mit-hermelin.de" , German, accessed on November 1, 2011
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d Dan Bloom: The changing face of Da Vinci's Lady with an Ermine: Scans show how artist changed his mind after masterpiece was originally painted without the animal. Daily Mail, September 30, 2014, accessed September 30, 2014 .
- ↑ Headgear of the early Italian Renaissance 1400–1500. Retrieved September 30, 2014 .
- ↑ Painting by Leonardo da Vinci: Poland buys Czartoryski art collection - culture . In: dpa . The daily mirror . December 30, 2016. Retrieved January 3, 2017.
- ^ The Multispectral Digitization of "The Lady with an Ermine" at the Czartoryski Museum and its virtual cleaning by Lumiere-Technology Specialists. (PDF) Lumiere Technology, November 12, 2007, accessed September 30, 2014 .
- ^ Advice with the lady, Bartosz Kapron. Retrieved November 6, 2018 .
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