Hunt for Lost Da Vinci Painting to Resume

ROME (Jan. 14, AP) - A real-life Da Vinci mystery, complete with tantalizing clues and cunning art sleuths, may be one step closer to a solution, as researchers resume the search for a lost Leonardo masterpiece believed to be concealed behind a wall in Florence's Palazzo Vecchio.

The search for Leonardo Da Vinci's masterpiece began 30 years ago, when art researcher Maurizio Seracini noticed a cryptic message painted on a fresco.

Some researchers believe a cavity in one of the walls of a museum may have preserved for more than four centuries Leonardo Da Vinci's unfinished mural painting of the "Battle of Anghiari."

The search for the Renaissance masterpiece began about 30 years ago, when art researcher Maurizio Seracini noticed a cryptic message painted on one of the frescoes decorating the "Hall of the 500" — once the city's seat of power.

"Cerca, trova" — "seek and you shall find" — said the words on a tiny green flag in the "Battle of Marciano in the Chiana Valley," one of the military scenes painted by 16th-century artist Giorgio Vasari.

Between 2002 and 2003, radar and X-ray scans allowed Seracini and his team to find a cavity behind the fresco that is the right size to cocoon Leonardo's work, which was long thought to have been destroyed when Vasari renovated the hall in the mid-16th century.

Hunt for lost Leonardo Da Vinci painting to resume in Florence



Well - a real mystery.

An ambitious painting, Leonardo used a type of plaster which he read about in a book by Pliny, with the unfortunate result that the work he had barely begun was irreparably ruined. Problems started as soon as Leonardo placed his brush to the wall at 9 am. The weather turned bad, the sky opened and it rained then on until nightfall. The sudden humidity liquefied the paste holding the cartoon in position; as Leonardo lifted his hand to start work the cartoon slid to the floor and tore.

An encaustic (translation: 'fixing by heat') technique was that chosen for the artwork. Leonardo took the precaution of doing a trial run of this technique; it was applied to a board and dried well in a warm environment. Firstly a layer of granular plaster was applied, this being primed to a hard flat finish; over this was added a layer of resinous pitch which was applied with sponges. The combination should have supplied a suitable base for the application of oils. During the painting process an ingenious scaffolding was used to raise Leonardo to the needed height for finishing the upper portion of the centre section of this work, but though the scaffolding was a brilliant design, the painting methods chosen were absolutely disastrous.

Because of the techniques used the colours refused to dry naturally. In an effort to overcome this a large fire was lit beneath the wall to apply a heat treatment. The upper areas then dried far too hard, while the colours from lower down simply ran and merged; at this point Leonardo gave up. There have been many suggestions as to why this project failed so spectacularly. The master may have been trying to outstrip his younger rival and hurried the process, or the resistance to drying may have been caused either by faulty linseed oil or defective plaster which rejected the colours. What is certain is that Leonardo failed to note an important part of Pliny's instructions which said:

"Those among the colours which require a dry, cretaceous, coating, and refuse to adhere to a wet surface, are purpurissum, indicum, caeruleum, milinum, orpiment, appianum, ceruse. Wax, too, is stained with all these colouring substances, for encaustic painting; a process which does not admit of being applied to walls...."

I think what that article is missing is a look at how today's colloquial can take license to adjust how we refer to things of old. These days are different. Very different. If I were to say simply, "Leonardo, there would probably be confusion as to which- DiCaprio or da Vinci. And I'm not going to speak the name in its entirety every time I discuss him. There's nothing wrong with it because we still understand what's being communicated. This article sounds more like "look how knowledgeable I am on obscure historical facts!" than a meaningful attempt to address what Shelley thinks is a problem.

I’m not sure what you are saying, what does Shelley think is a problem?

Whether the fresco is finished or not, the account I've linked to suggests that if the "cavity" is opened they'll find a kind of mushy, waxy mix of pigment and plaster with no recognisable image by Leonardo Da Vinci. The 52 foot high by 100 something ft wide fresco sunk like the Titanic over 600 years ago.

Nice link -- but is it not speculation as to what happened, or am I missing something?

On the other note, I see no reason not to say Da Vinci -- tho' the ninja turtle was Leonardo

Another note, I like Da Vinci -- my favourite is the sketch of The Virgin and Child with St Anne and St John the Baptist in the National Gallery -- and the painting of the Virgin on the Rocks isn't so bad either Plus was in Paris the other weekend, with not many people in the Louvre -- actaully had the chance to admire the Mona Lisa from close range (and see the Virgin's sister painting) Tho', Paris has turned into a DVC one-stop tourist-shop

This is quite cool too: http://www.nationalgallery.org.uk/co...s/leonardo.htm

Actually, I've also admired Da Vinci's tomb in Amboise -- I've turned into quite the pilgrim without knowing it

...which you were fortunate enough to view up close (through ten feet of glass).

They've updated the room somewhat -- the glass doesn't appear to be one foot deep -- it's embedded in a large artificial wall which you can walk behind. So if it doesn't have tardis like qualities, it's certinaly not 10 foot

“Leonardo’s ‘Battle of Anghiari’ was considered the highest work of art of the Renaissance at that time,” Seracini said. “For over 50 years afterwards, documents spoke of the wonderful horses of Leonardo with the highest admiration.”

If he and other researchers can prove that the Vasari murals conceal a greater treasure, “it may be possible,” Seracini believes, “to remove the Vasari fresco and the wall behind, extract Leonardo’s mural, and finally put the Vasari back in place.”

Seracini, who heads Editech -- a Florence-based company he founded in 1977 focused on the “diagnostics of cultural heritage” -- estimates that he’s worked on some 2,000 paintings, including 31 works by Raphael and three others by Da Vinci. Most of his equipment, he says, has been adapted from medical devices. Infrared, thermographic, ultraviolet and other kinds of scanners allow him to see images behind a painting’s visible layers.

Art historians have known that “Battle of Anghiari” existed from early sketches, from the copies made by Da Vinci contemporaries, and from the writings of those who saw it – one of whom described it as “miraculous.”

Seracini received his bachelor’s degree from UCSD’s Revelle College in 1973; he majored in applied mathematics and bioengineering, and spoke at his alma mater in April, as a Bioengineering Distinguished Lecturer, on “The Role of Science in Conservation of Cultural Heritage.” In 1975, he received a degree in electronic engineering from the University of Padua in Italy.