by Harlow Tighe, — Leonardo the Last Supper.

Chicago, University of Chicago Press, (1999). 1st ptg. VG in VG DJ in original slipcase (no defects noted). One of the most important works of the Renaissance was painted between 1494 and 1498 in the refectory of Santa Maria della. Grazie in Milan. It has endured centuries of controversy, neglect and difficulty beginning from the moment that the prior at the monastery complained to Leonardo that the work was taking too long. This book is the definitive document of the complete project to reverse these centuries of decline by restoring the painting and preserving it in a manner that generations of conservators have failed to do. Leonardo had jettisoned the traditional fresco technique of applying paint to wet plaster, a method unsuited to his slow and thorough execution, and created the work instead with an experimental technique that involved painting directly on the dry plaster and applied an oil tempera of questionable composition which caused the paint to flake immediately.