Lost Leonardo Painting Found
A long-lost painting by Leonardo da Vinci may have been found by a team of researchers in Italy. The team, led by Dr. Maurizio Seracini has spent almost 40 years searching for lost Leonardo da Vinci paintings.
The Battle of Anghiari
The Battle of Anghiari painting was first started by Leonardo in the Hall of 500 in the Pallazo Vecchio in 1504. As we all know Leonardo was always inventing & experimenting with new ways of doing things, unfortunately for The Battle of Anghiari he decided to try and apply oil paint directly onto plaster. A thunderstorm during the painting of The Battle caused excess humidity and the oils began to run into each other – Leonardo soon abandoned the project, however many still regarded the unfinished work as a masterpiece in its own right, many sources claim people would queue for hours to see the masters abandoned painting.
The unfinished work hung on the walls of The Hall of 500 for almost half a century before the powers that be decided to replace the painting. One of Leonardo’s fans, Giorgio Vasari, was chosen to replace the disintegrating work. Many historians believe that Giorgio Vasari would not have destroyed Leonardo’s work and would instead have tried to preserve it by building a false wall several inches in front of Leonardo’s painting. This is the reason why the team of Italian researchers is looking behind Giorgio Vasari’s 1563 mural, called The Battle of Marciano.
The Battle of Marciano
The team of researchers has drilled a small hole into Vasari’s artwork, inserted an endoscope, and taken samples from whatever lies behind. What they’ve discovered is that the black chalk-like substance they’ve retrieved is similar in composition to that used by Leonardo for his painting of the Mona Lisa.
Interestingly, on Vasari’s painting are flags, one of which reads – “Cerca Trova”, which translates to “Seek and you shall find”.
Cerca Trova
