Salaj (painter)

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Portrait of Gian Giacomo Caprotti by unknown painter

Salaj (* around 1480 in Milan ; † before March 10, 1524 there ; real name Gian Giacomo Caprotti ) was an Italian painter of the Lombard school from the immediate vicinity of Leonardo da Vinci .

Life

Leonardo: (Presumably) Salaj's head

Salaj was a son of Pietro di Giovanni, who was the tenant of a Leonardo da Vinci winery in front of Porta Vercellina . Around 1490, when he was ten, he came to the Leonardo workshop, where he was employed as an assistant. According to Vasari , Leonardo accepted the boy as a pupil because he liked his “grace and beauty” and his “curly hair”. In the first few years, however, he was mainly characterized by numerous pranks, some of which Leonardo documented in great detail. He described him as a "thief, liar, defiant head" and "sweet tooth". Even in 1497 he stated: “Salai steals the money.” But apparently he couldn't be angry with the student. Although he played some very bad pranks on him and his assistants and even stole money and his classmates silver pens and the like, it must have proven useful, as is documented for the year 1494, because he was allowed to stay in the workshop. According to Vasari, Leonardo himself taught him "many things in art" and he is said to have reworked some of his pupil's works himself.

Salaj accompanied Leonardo to Mantua , Venice and Florence . In Florence he was probably one of the two unnamed students who painted portraits under Leonardo's eyes in 1501. Salaj must have done a great job, because in 1505 he offered the Marchesa Isabella d'Este , who had been trying unsuccessfully for a picture of Leonardo da Vinci for years, to paint her “qualche cosa galante”. Shortly afterwards he accompanied Leonardo again to Milan, in order to follow him again briefly to Florence around 1507/1508 because of a trial. From there, Leonardo soon sent him back to Milan, where he was supposed to get letters to Charles d'Amboise and Francesco Melzi . He then followed his master to Rome , but was not taken to France . Instead, he went back to Milan, where he settled on the winery that his father had already worked. After the death of Leonardo da Vinci, he inherited half of this property "for the many faithful and valuable services".

He spent the last few years there until his death. He died at the age of 44 from an unspecified rifle shot and was buried in Milan on March 10, 1524. The monumental monument of Leonardo da Vinci on the Piazza della Scala in Milan shows Caprotti, together with three other artists from the school of Leonardo ( Marco d'Oggiono , Cesare da Sesto and Giovanni Boltraffio ).

Statue of Gian Giacomo Caprotti in Piazza della Scala in Milan.

Although Salaj is quite well documented as a person, art scholars still find it difficult to ascribe works by hand to him. In essence, he is awarded a group of pictures from the immediate vicinity of Leonardo, most of which are dated between 1500 and 1502. The starting point for this were motifs which Salaj has documented or which Salaj had in his possession. This selection was enriched by other works that were probably painted by the same hand. Nevertheless, until an undisputed picture is found, there is no definitive proof of its authorship.

There were rumors about the relationship between Leonardo and Salaj. For example, there is an imaginary dialogue between Phidias and Leonardo by the Milanese painter Giovanni Paolo Lomazzo from around 1563 , in which Leonardo is slipped in defense of physical love between men (or between men and boys), in which he names Salaj as his lover. In the same dialogue, Leonardo praises Salaj as extremely pretty with beautiful, wavy hair and well-proportioned mouth and eyes and describes him as his beloved "pincerna" (Latin cupbearer, alluding to the Ganymede myth ). The direct allusion to a possible sexual relationship can be found in the Codex Atlanticus , where two erect penises (on legs and with tails) are drawn on the back of sheets 132 and 133, which transform into an anus entitled “Salaj” . The two sheets also contain a sketch of a bicycle and a caricature of a young man who is supposed to represent Salaj. Salaj did not do the well-known bicycle drawing that was originally attributed to Leonardo, but rather only two circles on the sheet.

The drawings are presumably from the hand of one of Leonardo's jealous assistant. Other sources claim that Salaj was the model for the painting Mona Lisa . Accordingly, the painting is a representation of a man. The name "Mona Lisa" is an anagram to "Mon Salai" (German: My Salai ). Da Vinci's first biographer, Giorgio Vasari (1511–1574), mentioned this thesis on anagram.

Some attributed works

Monna Vanna - Act version of the Mona Lisa , Louvre, Paris
  • Budapest, Szépművészeti Múzeum
    • Mary with the child and the boy John
  • Florence, Galleria degli Uffizi
    • Mary with the child and St. Anne (so-called St. Anna Selbdritt)
  • Los Angeles, Armand Hammer Museum
    • Mary with the child and St. Anne (so-called St. Anna Selbdritt)
  • Milan, Pinacoteca Ambrosiana
    • Saint John the Baptist
  • Milan, Pinacoteca di Brera
    • Mary with the child, Saints John the Baptist, Paul and an angel making music
    • Mary with the child and the saints Peter and Paul
  • Paris, Louvre , portrait of a woman with a bared upper body (so-called Monna Vanna)
  • Switzerland, private collection
    • Portrait of a woman with a bared upper body (so-called Monna Vanna)
  • St. Petersburg, Hermitage
    • Portrait of a woman with a bared upper body (so-called Monna Vanna)

literature

Web links

Commons : Salaj  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Bicycle drawing by Leonardo da Vinci
  2. ↑ Giovanni Dall'Orto: Leonardo da Vinci In Robert Aldrich and Wotherspoon Gary: Who's who in gay and lesbian history , London Routledge, 2002 (2.ed.), S. 313f. see. giovannidallorto.com
  3. ↑ Die Welt: Da Vinci's "Mona Lisa" was probably a gay man , February 3, 2011. (Accessed February 4, 2011)
  4. ↑ Queer.de: Was Mona Lisa a man? , February 3, 2011. (Accessed February 4, 2011)
personal data
SURNAME Salaj
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Andrea Salaino; Salai, Andrea; Caprotti, Gian Giacomo; Salai
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Italian painter
DATE OF BIRTH around 1480
PLACE OF BIRTH Milan
DATE OF DEATH buried March 10, 1524
Place of death Milan