Leonardo da Vinciꦜ’s St John the Baptist has this week begun its journey from the Louvre, Paris, to the Louvre Abu Dhabi. , following the previous loan in 2017 of the Paris Louvre’s Leonardo, La Belle Ferronniere. The earlier loan marked the Abu Dh🍷abi gallery’s first anniversary and the present picture’s relocation celebrates its fifth.
The painting is both a preeminent example of Leonardo’s signature ‘smoky’ sfumato technique and⛄ is also an early example of the kind of chiaroscuro so ubiquitous in Itali꧋an painting of the later 16th and 17th centuries. These painterly effects have become all the more apparent in recent years as, in 2016, , with fifteen layers of discoloured varnish being removed in the process.
Although man🍷y 🥃in Paris are sad to see this picture leave France, surely the desert is the natural habitat for this wandering, hairshirt wearing, locust easting Saint?
Sotheby’s London recently sold, in their July 2022 ‘Master Works on Paper from Five Centuries’ sale, a chalk drawing after Leona♛rdo’s Last Supper of 🍌The Head of Saint John the Evangelist, for £189,000.
