The Madonna of the Rocks,
oil on panel, 70 x 48 cm, framed

Provenance:
Collection of Contessa Rosa Bertoglio (1836–1916), Milan;
Private European collection

Literature:
D. Sant’Ambrogio, Un dipinto leonardesco ad Affori presso Milano, in: Cosmos Catholicus. Grande Rivista Cattolica Illustrata, vol. 3, no. 1, 1901, p. 540, mentioned under note 2 (as copy);
N. Bertoglio Pisani, La Vergine delle Roccie di Leonardo da Vinci, in: Arte e Storia, vol. 22, no. 4–5, 1903, p. 24 (as Follower of Leonardo);
F. Malaguzzi Valeri, La Corte di Lodovico il Moro. Bramante e Leonardo da Vinci, vol. II, Milan 1915, illustrated p. 408, fig. 464, p. 420, note 1, p. 421 (as ‘ignoto copista, dell’inizio del cinquecento, Maniera dei Piazza da Lodi’);
F. Porzio (ed.) Zenale e Leonardo. Tradizione e rinnovamento della pittura lombarda, exhibition catalogue, Milan 1982, p. 131, mentionend under cat. no. 39 (as ‘scuola lodigiana’)

The present painting is registered in the Fototeca Zeri under no. 34212 (as Circle of Leonardo da Vinci, whereabouts unknown).

The present painting relates to the celebrated composition by Leonardo da Vinci in the Louvre, Paris (inv. no. 777).

In 1483, Leonardo received the commission to paint a panel depicting the Madonna and Child for the church of San Francesco Grande in Milan. Leonardo modified the iconography stipulated in the contract, painting instead the Meeting of the Christ Child with the Infant Saint John the Baptist, an episode narrated in the Life of John according to Serapion and other apocryphal texts regarding the infancy of Christ. This gave rise to the composition of the Madonna of the Rocks (a name in use from the 19th century onwards), which is today one of Leonardo’s most celebrated compositions. This was probably the painting on panel now in the Louvre, Paris which is stylistically dated by critics to 1483–1486; it is possible that the painting, which never reached the altar for which it was intended, was bought directly by Ludovico il Moro and later passed into the French Royal collections, from where it went to the Louvre.

In the meantime, the painter left Milan in 1499, having probably already begun a second version of the Madonna of the Rocks, which is identified as the painting now in the National Gallery, London for which a date between the last years of the  15th and the first years of the 16th century has been proposed. The painting in the National Gallery version differs from that in the Louvre in certain details, such as the absence of the gesture of the angel pointing to the Christ Child, or the presence of the halos, which do not appear in the French version.

The success of Leonardo’s iconography was immediate. Already in 1508 Giovanni Ambrogio de Predis had asked for permission to copy the altarpiece of San Francesco Grande, executing an exact copy under the master’s supervision, which has yet to be identified.

The present painting resembles this first version of the Madonna of the Rocks, now in the Louvre, although it is smaller in size, and it was probably executed just a few years after Leonardo’s original: Malaguzzi Valeri (see in literature) considered this an early sixteenth century work, stylistically comparable to the output of the workshop of the Piazza da Lodi. The dating of this painting seems to be around Leonardo’s second stay in Milan (1506–1513), who actively promoted the execution of copies of both versions. However, the painting under discussion is the only copy, that imitates the shaped top of the original altarpiece. The most interesting part is the grotto in the background, emerging from this anonymous artist’s fantasy who ignores the authentic and precise geological imitation of Leonardo’s grotto. This creative interpretation of the grotto cannot be found in any other copy of the Madonna of the Rocks.