Leonardo Da Vinci Book

I’ve been a great admirer of Leonardo da Vinci since I was 12-14 years old, when, completely out of the blue, I decided that he was my favourite painter of all time (side note: not because he painted Mona Lisa!). Don’t ask me why. I didn’t know back then. Ever since I’ve been an avid reader of everything I could find – be it a classical biography written by Michael Kemp or (sorry, if your exquisite taste can’t handle it) Dan Brown. Surely, I didn’t like all those books equally. I didn’t like many of them at all, but, as Martin Kemp puts it in the preface of this book, “the silly season on Leonardo never closes”. That’s, literally, the best opening line for the book on Leonardo da Vinci I’ve ever come across. The only kind of Leonardo books I stayed away from was so-called classics of the study of da Vinci (say, books written before WWII). Now, having read enough of modern and relatively modern biographies and monographs, I’ve finally decided to go for the books which formed Leonardo discourse.

Kenneth Clark, the author of this book, is quite a personality himself. He was a British art historian and museum director first of Ashmolean Museum in Oxford and then of Britain's National Gallery. Among other things, he was chosen to catalogue the collection of Leonardo da Vinci drawings at Windsor Castle, and due to this experience of his now we are able to read his musings on Leonardo. Unlike many precursors and followers, Kenneth Clark focuses mostly on Leonardo as a painter, briefly mentioning hot topics of possible homosexuality and childhood trauma (hello, Mr Nicholl!), and aims to explain why Leonardo is considered to be one of the greatest painters who’s ever lived. His love for his subject is evident, tender but not at all blind. Clark kindly points out flaws and defects, too ambitious or unfinished projects – actually, everything we can put a decent genius to shame – but he never intends to dethrone Leonardo. On the contrary, Clark makes Leonardo’s abilities, power of imagination, energy and curiosity flourish, portraying them as traits of an extraordinary human being rather than a deity. Hence I can’t but admire Clark’s writing, full of witty teasing and observance which never turns into mockery or misrepresentation. Of course, to some extent this book, written in 1939 and then revised in 1988, is naïve. It feels as if it still develops its language and tools, trying to accommodate the combination of art criticism concepts and adoration for the subject of study. Kenneth Clark and his book still live in the world where Salvator Mundi was attributed to one of Leonardo’s followers, and The Last Supper major restoration was still in process.

What makes this work valuable in the world abundant in books, studies, documentaries and speculations on Leonardo’s life and work? Mostly its author’s point of view and his beautiful, masterful prose - the way he looks at Leonardo and the way he makes us look at Leonardo; the way he’s trying to teach us to look at him with delicacy and respect which many modern biographers lack.