LEONARDO DA VINCI’S
£860 Million Man
For curators of a blockbuster Leonardo da Vinci exhibition which is opened, it’s been a nerveracking few days. A total of 140 works by the greatest artist - who perhaps also possessed the greatest mind - in history were being brought together to commemorate the 500th anniversary
of his death in 1519. Da Vinci was the ultimate Renaissance man. By the time of his death, aged 67, he had become an expert in countless areas: drawing, painting, sculpture, architecture, science, music, mathematics, engineering, literature, anatomy, geology, astronomy, botany, palaeontology and cartography.
And the centrepiece of the
Louvre show in Paris was to have been the most famous drawing in the world, da Vinci’s Vitruvian Man.
The fragile, 530-year-old work was set to be transported from its home in Venice, over the Alps, in a sealed glass box in a climate-controlled lorry accompanied by an armed guard. Then lawyers got involved.
An Italian court halted the loan after a legal challenge from Italia Nostra, a heritage body that declared the drawing was too delicate and would be irreversibly damaged by light for the eight weeks it is on show in Paris. It is usually kept in a darkened vault at the Gallerie dell’accademia in Venice.
On Monday, however, a judge rejected a last-minute appeal by Italia Nostra after determining the complaint ‘[did] not present sufficient evidence’ to block the loan. As Vitruvian Man is set to be seen by the millions expected to flock to the Louvre, HARRY MOUNT tells you everything you need to know about the masterpiece.